Everything and Nothing
by MyTigerNacho
Summary: She hated being unconscious. It always ruined whatever she had planned for the day. [Edited! :)]
1. Chapter 1

Arien hated being unconscious. It always ruined whatever she had planned for the day.

Thankfully, this time she had had only one plan. She had planned to die. It hadn't been a conscious decision; nevertheless she had gone there for revenge, and she had not planned to come out alive. But she _was_ alive, which came as a bit of a surprise to her. She was usually so meticulous with carrying out her plans.

 _Of all the plans that she had ever made, why did this one have to be the one to fail?_

 _How could she have possibly survived that fall, that lapse in control, that pain so crippling she had attempted to rip her own heart out?_

 _Would she have to live with this pain? Or would she be able to find someone capable of killing her?_

As she drifted in and out of consciousness, Arien found that she could not bring herself to care about the answers to any of these questions.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

Muzaka sat in a utilitarian chair next to a small, functional bed. Well, one of the two small beds. Frankenstein had called this the recovery room, but if Muzaka had been the one recovering he probably would have gone crazy from boredom. There were two beds, two chairs, and a large window. That was it. Maybe humans recovered faster if they were surrounded by nothing of interest?

A woman lay on the bed next to him. She still hadn't woken up yet. She had no life-threatening physical injuries, so Frankenstein had placed her in this 'recovery room' with just a device that made sure her heart was still beating. Muzaka couldn't really blame him for his haste, of course. Frankenstein had had enough on his hands dealing with his own injuries, Kentas's injuries, Garda's injuries and Lunark's injuries, to say nothing of Raizel and the poor kid's injuries.

The experiments the werewolves, his _people_ , had performed, not just on humans but on their own kind, still made his blood boil and his vision turn red.

The fight hadn't lasted that long. He had taken out Maduke with relative ease. Raizel had taken out the Kravei clan leader, and between himself, Kentas, Lunark, Frankenstein, and Raizel, over a dozen of the more ignorant and arrogant warriors were killed. If you could call them warriors. The rest fled with their tails between their legs.

Cowards.

The other members of the family were okay, though. Well, that wasn't exactly true. He had seen the bodies of the family members who had had their energy and lives taken from them. Energy that had been given to the kid downstairs in an effort to _make_ someone who had enough power to defeat him. And the fact that the kid would have died, had Frankenstein not been there, Muzaka was sure meant nothing to Maduke. The kid would have just been one of many disposable pawns to be used so that Maduke wouldn't have to fight him directly.

Damn coward.

But Maduke was dead now. And here they were, back in South Korea, at Frankenstein's house. He hadn't really planned to come here afterwards (or at all, really), but Garda and Kentas were a mess because of those experiments, and they deserved better than to be left to suffer like that. They were true warriors, after all. Plus, Frankenstein (or, more likely, Frankenstein at Raizel's insistence) offered to take care of them.

Muzaka had taken him up on the offer.

He sure as hell didn't trust Crombell to do the job, even before Frankenstein discovered all the tracking and tapping devices and poison bombs Crombell had stuck inside him, or that the bastard had apparently taken his heart and stuck it in that human kid downstairs. So it was probably a good thing Frankenstein hadn't let him stay until he had made sure Crombell wouldn't get away with using him to spy or whatever.

Well, that explained why _he_ was here, but not this unknown woman.

The two noble kids that were under Raizel's care found her near the little island where he had fought with that enhanced werewolf (what was his name? Gray-something?). When they found her she was unconscious and slowly bleeding from the chest, but she had no other apparent injuries; she was wearing a big cloak, but underneath she was wearing a white robe thing, and there's no way they wouldn't have been able to see blood on it. But her injuries wasn't why she was in Frankenstein's house right now.

The enormous explosion of power that, according to the kids that Raizel had taken in, appeared around the same place she did was.

The honey-tongued, enhanced human called Tao brought up several images from cameras around the city. Around the same time Muzaka had been killing Maduke, an incredible amount of black energy wreathed in silvery white appeared in the east, followed by an impact that evaporated most of the water in the area and left a sizable crater. Muzaka couldn't tell from the video, but the nobles and enhanced kids claimed that the energy was one of the strongest they had ever felt.

The kids originally planned to leave the woman in the hands of a married couple who were enhanced humans and for some reason called Frankenstein 'Principal Lee.' However, given that it seemed likely that her wounds had been inflicted by a werewolf (there were stab marks on her chest that certainly look like they were done by claws), as well as the critical state of everyone's injuries, it was decided that she would stay here for questioning. And since he was practically the strongest person alive and was not severely injured, Frankenstein declared that he would be the one to watch over her in case she turned out to be an enemy.

… Although Frankenstein probably just wanted to boss him around and make him do mundane chores.

So now he had nothing to do but stare at this unconscious woman. He didn't mind that much, really. He was kinda curious about her. Or more specifically, about her opponent. He doubted that energy came from her, because he could only feel a small amount of energy from her even while sitting right next to her. More likely it came from whoever she was fighting; she _was_ injured, after all. But if that's the case, how did she survive? Maybe she specializes in defense? Well, it didn't really matter; besides, he was sure those kids have a different standard as to what 'strong' means, but on the off-chance that her opponent _was_ as strong as they say, then maybe he could finally –

Her clothes changed.

One moment she's wearing pure white, the next she's in solid black, complete with metal jewelry. Her power increased for an instant as it happened, but then went back down again.

Okay, that was strange.

Even though he'd seen Raizel and Frankenstein do similar things, this woman wasn't a noble nor did she have a contract with a noble. How had she done that? And why had it happened now? He stood up so he could look at her more closely. Her wavy, dark red hair was now even more striking against the black fabric, and her skin looked a bit tanner, as if the white she had been wearing had made her looked washed out. Other than that, there were no changes to her outward appearance, heartbeat, breathing rate, or overall energy.

He was about to sit back down when her eyes slowly opened.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

A/N: Hey guys, thanks for reading!

So this is actually a crossover between Bleach and Noblesse, but for some reason the crossover section wouldn't let me post it there. But I've always thought that the Bleach Universe and the Noblesse Universe had so many parallels that it's really not all that weird to think that they're actually just one universe. There aren't that many crossovers between these two universes so I thought, what the hell? As I develop this OC and this story I'm gonna do my best to highlight all the similarities between the two worlds.

Pleeeeassse review and all that jazz :)


	2. Chapter 2

She kept myself completely relaxed as she woke up and began assessing her situation.

The pain in her chest was gone. Or at least the physical pain. But she was expecting that.

What she hadn't expected was to be lying on a bed. That was kind of weird.

 ** _Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep._**

Was that a heart monitor? So not only was she alive, but she had ended up in the Human World, was rescued and even sent to a hospital? Well, that might explain why she was still alive.

Wait, no, that's impossible, Arien thought as her mind began to clear. Humans can't see her, so humans would have never even _found_ her, much less brought her to a hospital. So if she hadn't been saved by humans, then who – ?

Huh. There was someone in the room with her.

She must have been more out of it than she thought for her to have not immediately noticed that there was someone there. Whoever it was was putting out a lot of energy, even though they were clearly just standing there, not even moving. In fact, it felt like there were at least a dozen people in close proximity, all emitting varying levels of power, but doing nothing. Or at least nothing that would require emitting so much energy.

What sort of spiritual being doesn't curb their energy so as not to draw the attention of Hollows? It's basic knowledge, after all, and she was not in the mood to fight off a horde of Hollows just because these idiots skipped Spiritual Energy 101.

Though now that she say that, their energy didn't really feel like spiritual energy.

Hmm. She could only guess that these people were Fullbringers or something. She had never met any Fullbringers before, but she knew of their existence and general background. Maybe their spiritual energy is emitted in a way that makes it hard for Hollows and Shinigami to identify. But that still didn't explain why they saved her.

Vague and general questions like this went through her head. Regardless of who they were, they had obviously been concerned enough to try and save her. And even though she had not really wanted to be saved, she would have to thank them, regardless of their intentions. Though maybe they were just good people. That would be nice. But somehow she doubted it. Life was never that kind to her. Chances are they had brought her here – wherever 'here' was – for their own purposes and agendas. She would just have to fight her way out if it came to that. That's what she always did.

With that conviction she decided that she might as well take a look at who the strange person who was standing over her.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

She didn't seem surprised to find him standing next to her. That was good. He had been worried she was gonna panic and lash out. He has seen what happens when Frankenstein's stuff gets destroyed, and Muzaka did not need to give him another reason to hate him. Especially since he might be here awhile.

Luckily, the only thing she did was sit up and arch her eyebrows up at him, before looking around the room with an expression of polite curiosity. She apparently didn't find anything more interesting (no surprise there since this room was so boring), so she looked at him again.

Muzaka stared back.

Huh. What in the world should he say to her? He had half-expected an attack, an escape attempt, even cowering. He was prepared for those reactions. He wasn't really prepared for her to just look at him like he was a mildly interesting painting or something. Maybe she was in shock. Guess he would just have to go with the flow.

"Hello," she said simply.

He hadn't expected her to speak first, and in English. Though he supposed that would explain the dark red hair and blue eyes.

"Hey," Muzaka responded easily. "What's your name?"

"… Arien." It might have been his imagination, but for a moment she looked sad.

"Just Arien, huh?" She gave a small smile, and nodded.

"Just Arien," she confirmed. "What about you? What's your name?"

"Oh, I'm Muzaka," he grinned. She arched her eyebrow at him again and smirked. "Just Muzaka?" she asked.

Hmph. He had walked right into that one.

"Yeah," he laughed. "Just Muzaka."

She nodded, the slight smile still on her face. She glanced out the window.

"Well Muzaka, could you tell me where I am and how I got here?"

Once again she had thrown him off. He could understand maybe being a little hazy about the exact details of where you are, but to not know how you got there? Does she have amnesia? And is she really not curious about who they are? She gave no sign of recognition when she heard his name or anything, so he doubted she already knows who he is. Well, whatever, he would just keep going with the flow.

"Yeah, this is a place called South Korea," he explained. "You got to this house because the people who live here felt a huge explosion of energy. When they went to investigate they found you floating in the water and thought you might be a fellow victim of the Union. Though I have no idea how you got here in general."

Finally, an expression of interest! Well, surprise, really. She must not have been expecting him to say South Korea. Was that why she started speaking English right from the beginning? Well, he didn't blame her. He sure as hell didn't look like a typical South Korean.

Or maybe she had just been surprised by his mention of the Union.

Her face now held a slight frown and a little confusion as she stared blankly at the floor.

"I guess that comes as a surprise to you."

She nodded, still staring at the ground.

Muzaka decided to let her sit for a minute. He still didn't really know anything about her or her intentions, but it seemed pretty obvious she wasn't here to attack them. And even though he still couldn't feel much energy from her, he couldn't shake the feeling that she was something more than she looked. She just didn't act the way he would have expected any relatively human woman to act in a situation like this. Well he was sure Frankenstein would want information about her, so he may as well ask questions. Besides, now he was curious.

"So, are you from England?"

She started, almost as if she had forgotten he was still in the room.

"No," she frowned, "I'm from Japan."

Huh. Okay, well there went that theory.

"Oh. I just thought, what with your appearance and speaking in English…" he trailed off.

She smiled, nodding. "Well, I'm only half Japanese. And I thought it would be a safe bet to start with English, since most countries in the Western world, which is where I assumed we were based on _your_ appearance, know at least rudimentary English. It is comforting to know that I am at least still in the East. "

So, her being from Japan means that she'll want to go back. That's kinda disappointing. He had wanted to know more about her and her situation.

"Well I'm sure we can take you back to your home."

She turned away, and for a brief moment her expression became pained.

"I'm afraid I no longer have a home to go back to," she half-whispered, looking up at him with a sad smile.

Her eyes. Her eyes were full of pain, pain that he was all too familiar with. The pain of loss, the pain of solitude. Pain that practically everyone in this house could relate to on some level, he realized. It wasn't right. It wasn't _right_. No one should feel this kind of pain, should be without a place to call home. Before he could even think, he opened his mouth.

"Well then, would you like to live here with us?"

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** Had a few formatting issues with this one so just bear with me please J

Edit: This edit is to tell you that I have edited this chapter. Yay!


	3. Chapter 3

She looked at him like he had just asked her if the sky was blue.

"No," she said bluntly. "I have no idea who any of you are."

Oh. Right. That made sense. Of course she wouldn't exactly jump at a chance to stay with a total stranger. Not to mention the rest of the people who lived here. Wait, how had she known there were other people living here? She hadn't seen evidence of anyone besides him. Oh wait, he had said something about 'the people that live here' earlier. That must be how she knew.

Regardless, her response made him let out a small, genuine chuckle. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

She just nodded absently, took off the brown cloak that she'd been wearing, and stood up.

She was pretty tall for a women. Probably only two or three inches below 6 feet. A good bit shorter than him, but still, that wasn't exactly new for him. She walked around the room - finally stopping to observe the city out the window - with the grace and confidence that no normal human could achieve, no matter how impressive they claimed their lineage was. So like him, she was probably a lot older than she looked.

Well, if it was possible for Frankenstein to live this long then it wasn't strange for other humans to figure out how to halt the aging process as well. Had she figured it out herself, or had someone done it to her? But if it had been the latter, why the hell would someone use it on an enhanced human who was obviously so weak?

Humans were such irrational beings.

Before his distaste for humanity led him to darker thoughts (note to self, talk to Frankenstein about making some of those pills like the ones Crombell was making for him), he quickly distracted himself. Although that really just meant he went back to staring at the woman.

No, not 'the woman.' Arien.

Without the cloak he could see her outfit better. Everything she was wearing was pitch black, even the bracelet she wore on her right wrist. The only accessory that wasn't black was on her chest, which appeared to be a combination of brightest silver and purest white.

Her outfit was very… strange. There was no fabric on her back. However, the edges of the fabric that ran alongside her back were lined with black metal. Much of the garment's upper-half was also lined with black metal, although in the light from the window it seemed as if there was a faint blue sheen to some of the metal.

The only thing on her back were two, inch-thick bands of this black metal, one starting under each arm, which rose up at a slant across her shoulder blades and met at the top of her back where they merged to form a single band. This band rose up an inch or so to her neck and then wrapped around it, so that it looked like she had a solid black collar on.

Another black band descended from the collar an inch or so and was connected to the silver and white symbol on her chest, which kinda looked like a cross that had grown a few too many appendages. Maybe a cross that had been turned sideways and merged with an upright cross? Plus there was a circle of metal in the center of the symbol that connected all the appendages together.

Well, putting that aside, the three uppermost arms (legs? appendages?) of the upright cross had black metal bands attached to them that continued on to meet the metal that lined the fabric at the top of her breast. The garment also had black metal lining under the breast and along the waist. It also had a small swath of fabric missing on her upper right thigh, leaving it bare, and a thigh-high split on her left side. She was not wearing any shoes.

The design was not familiar to him, but for all its strangeness it looked very uniform and functional. Even if he couldn't tell what the function was.

She turned around, probably because there was really nothing interesting to look at out the window, but at that moment someone knocked at the door. After a moment's pause, the door swung open and Lunark stepped in. She was no longer wearing the white and gold that the Union favored, but a simple white T-shirt and grey pants. Out of everyone else who had gone to the werewolves' island her injuries had been the least serious, since Raizel had stepped in before she had fought Ignes for very long.

Lunark pulled up short, probably surprised that the woman was awake. Muzaka smiled at her, trying to reassure her that everything was fine. He put his hands in his pocket as he stood up and made his way toward Lunark so that he was between her and Arien. He didn't want Arien to feel cornered or she might panic and break something. Damnit, why did Frankenstein have to be such a pain-in-the-ass?

"Hey Lunark, what's up?" he asked pleasantly.

"I wanted to ensure that there was nothing that you needed, Muzaka-nim," Lunark replied somewhat stiffly.

Muzaka took this as his cue to take care of the elephant in the room.

"Well now that you mention it I could use something to eat," I said easily, trying to keep the mood light. "Oh by the way, Lunark, this is Arien, Arien, Lunark." He gestured amiably to each of them with one hand as he said their names.

"It's nice to meet you," said Arien with a small, polite smile. Lunark just nodded. A pretty standard exchange. He shouldn't have been worried.

And yet, the whole exchange felt a little off. That was usually how people reacted to another person when they were introduced, or at least something similar: with some sort of acknowledgment. Yet they both seemed so disinterested. Lunark, he guessed, was disinterested because Arien was an enhanced human, had unknown origins, and seemed weak. Plus there was the fact that Lunark had just abandoned (and been abandoned by) her own people and was worried about Kentas and Garda. All of that was at least understandable.

Arien acted like she understood that this was what she was supposed to say and do, but her mind was elsewhere. Like she was simply going through the motions. It wasn't like she was disregarding Lunark; no, it was more like she just had much bigger problems and concerns. And what kind of run-in-the-mill enhanced human had more pressing concerns than being at the mercy of not just one but _two_ werewolf warriors?

All of that was to say that it didn't look like these two were going to be striking up conversation with each other any time soon.

He would have to step in. He didn't really mind. After all, he was used to just talking, regardless if the other party replied or appeared interested.

"How bout we move this to the kitchen?"

The two women nodded, though he could tell Lunark was still unsure about Arien. He didn't see the harm in it. It wasn't like Arien was a threat with her low energy level. He knew Lunark was probably just worried about Kentas, and by extension the security of the house, but he wondered if she had considered the fact that she had been in this house just as long as Arien had, and that it was also _known_ that she had been working with the landlord's enemy.

He decided not to bring it up.

"So, how is everyone doing down there?" he asked Lunark.

"They're alive," she responded bluntly, throwing another mistrustful glance at Arien.

Muzaka nodded. That was good to hear, at least. He had worried that she had come up here to tell him that one or both of the warriors downstairs wasn't going to make it.

When they walked into the kitchen area, the first thing he noticed was that it was empty except for Raizel, who sitting on a black couch with his back to them, drinking a cup of tea. Muzaka paused for a moment. He had spent so many centuries visiting Raizel, and each time he was always at his window, staring out. Muzaka had never seen Raizel walk more than three feet away from the damn thing. So seeing him now just sitting there was kind of a surreal moment for him. He was happy for him, but at the same time he couldn't help but feel the smallest twinge of jealousy. Jealousy at what, he honestly didn't know. Frankenstein? These noble kids? The enhanced humans? Or maybe the human children he had pictures of, the ones that didn't even know he was a noble, the ones Raizel called his friends. After all, Raizel had done with all of these people what Muzaka had never been able to: gotten Raizel to leave his window.

None of that mattered, though. He _was_ happy that Raizel had found others. It made him feel good to know that his friend wouldn't be left alone when he himself was gone.

Raizel turned to look at them as they walked in and Muzaka smiled at him.

"Hey Raizel!" he said loudly as he plopped down on the couch opposite the poised Noble, throwing his hair off one end and crossing his ankles at the other. "Got anything to eat?"

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** So I'm assuming that Franky had figured out how to increase his lifespan even before his contract with Rai. Idt they mention the origin in the manhwa, so I guess the only proof I have to back this up is that Franky doesn't look any different from the time that he meets Rai to the time that he makes a contract with him 10 years later.

I had some trouble describing Arien's outfit because I have a very distinct picture of it in my head, but it might've been a little confusing coming out. If you're still confused it basically looks like the Black Ops Brigade uniform that Soi Fon wears under her captain's haori, except for the black metal lining on the top-half, the symbol on the chest, and the thigh-high split up the left thigh (and without the white accents or the sandals Shinigami typically wear). Hopefully that helps.

Also, this was a very Muzaka-centric chapter, mostly because I hope to make him a pretty big character in my story and I like the way that he describes Arien since he's relatively honest and naïve, so his descriptions and impressions of her are honest and less suspicious, and usually right. He's also one of the few characters that arguably doesn't really care too much about either side, so he's not as emotionally invested as the others, making it easier to write from his POV. Although it's also because I'm a really big Muzaka fan and find his almost anti-hero-like character very fun and intriguing. I'm still on the fence about making Arien and Muzaka a romantic couple so we'll just see where it goes.

Finally, I'm planning on keeping the pace relatively slow for the next chapter or three so the people of Rai's household can get a feel for Arien and vice versa (there's gonna be some surprises on both ends). But yeah, please look forward to the pace picking up after that, including getting to learn Arien's zanpakutou's name and abilities :). Wow, this seems like a lot of A/N. Sorry about that!


	4. Chapter 4

Arien's mind was in a thick fog as they walked down a clean hallway. That was fine. Because when the fog lifted all she could see were the bodies of her friends, her siblings, her _family_ , of the only people she had cared about and who had cared about her. How could she have let this happen? Hadn't she been training for thousands of years, studying every aspect of medicine, souls, and spiritual energy she could find, so that she could protect them? The scene kept replaying over and over in her mind. Why did she have to leave at that time, why couldn't she have come back sooner, why couldn't she figure out what was wrong with them, why was she the only one who survived, why did they have to leave her alone, _why couldn't she save_ \- ?

She stopped her own accusations short. No. There was nothing she could do about these questions; they had no answers. She needed to snap out of it. She was in a house full of potential threats. She should be observing these people and her surroundings, so she could determine their intentions for bringing her here. She pushed the fog away. What had happened had happened (oh, but it hurt so _bad_ , she didn't know anything could hurt so _bad_ ) and right now she needed to focus on the present.

The house they had brought her to was fairly large, practically a mansion. There were probably two, maybe three stories of bedrooms and bathrooms and such. She was personally more interested in the part that appeared to be underground. It was almost certainly a lab. So at least one member of this household was a scientist. All scientists seemed to have an underground lab or two. Though she supposed in this day and age having one out of sight was probably best. She could tell that most of the inhabitants of the house were downstairs in the lab, which made sense. These two had implied that someone had been injured.

She assumed she was here because they wanted to experiment on her. The thought almost made her chuckle out loud despite her morose mood. Let them try. There were a lot of people here though. They probably thought they could overpower her.

And speaking of power.

The man named Muzaka and the woman called Lunark both had very similar energies, though she could tell Muzaka's aura was a lot stronger. Everything about Muzaka screamed power and confidence. Except his soul, perhaps. His soul cried despair.

Lunark had called him the equivalent of 'Lord." (Arien was fluent in practically every spoken language there was, so the honorific the woman had used was not lost on her). But just how old was he? He didn't look any older than, say, 25, but she guessed it would have been rather hypocritical of her to judge someone's age and experience based on their appearance. She still concluded that he was probably pretty young, because underneath all that confidence, he seemed so lost. Why else would he have sincerely asked a total stranger to live with them, without so much as consulting the other tenants? She could have been putting up an act to gain his sympathy! What kind of innocent world had he been living in? It was almost like he had confidence in his abilities, but not in _himself_. But if he was so young, how could he be so confident in anything? Perhaps that was the reason for the painful feeling in his soul, being so obviously young but in a position of power. Or perhaps it was just arrogance; she had seen plenty of young kids who believed their power was invincible just because they had been born with a little strength. So Muzaka was probably young and strong, but naïve. He probably wouldn't be too hard to take down.

Lunark on the other hand was at least cautious. She seemed reluctant to speak freely in front of her, because of course she was. Arien surmised that Lunark was older than Muzaka, perhaps an advisor or an attendant. She would probably prove more difficult to fight if she was a skilled in combat, especially since Arien didn't know her abilities.

Because she _still_ didn't know _what_ these two people were.

Her best guess was still Fullbringers. She knew that Fullbringers were humans that were affected by Hollow's spiritual energy while they were still in the womb, and now that she concentrated more closely on their energy she _could_ feel something that vaguely resembled Hollow energy from them.

She didn't think Fullbringers had Lords though. But she also didn't know if they _didn't_ , so until she saw proof to the contrary, she would tentatively assume that these two were Fullbringers.

The guy sitting on a couch in what appeared to be a normal, modern sitting room, on the other hand…

She followed Muzaka as he fell rather gracelessly onto the couch opposite the man drinking tea - whose name was apparently Raizel - so that she could get a better look at the new stranger.

The first thing she noticed were his clothes. It looked like a high school uniform. A very classy high school uniform it was true, but a high school uniform nonetheless. The second thing she noticed was his poise. He made something as simple and mundane as sitting down drinking tea look so regal. She had never seen a human who exhibited such piety (not that she had much experience with normal humans, but some things were just common sense).

This man's identity was even more confusing than the other two.

She could feel his incredible power. It leaked out of him as easily and naturally as rain from a dense cloud, and like everyone else in this house he was making no noticeable effort to restrain it.

Hmm, was that a power play? Were they trying to intimidate her, make her feel like there was no option but for her to submit? Or did they not even realize it? Because damn, if they had been Shinigami this whole place would be crawling with Hollows. Although now that she thought that they may have just made barriers around the house that Hollows avoid. That would explain why Aceso and especially Nike were being so silent and withdrawn.

But anyway, back to the unidentified man. His power was immense, dominating, and vast, and it somehow was in perfect harmony with his pious appearance and actions. But his _soul_. His soul possessed a will as hard as diamonds, but fragile somehow, like someone had hit it at just the right angle a few too many times, and it was in danger of shattering. In fact, she was rather shocked it hadn't, and once again marveled at the strength of his will. She had never felt such a fierce determination to live. That must be nice. She no longer had a reason to be so determined to live. It made her a little jealous.

Though it was quickly forgotten when she felt a strong hunger kick. Well, she had certainly expended a lot of energy when she had nearly lost control, not to mention she had been unconscious for a while.

The man –Raizel – still hadn't answered Muzaka's question about food, though his brow did look slightly scrunched up.

"What? No food?" Muzaka said with mock disbelief and disappointment.

Raizel hadn't even said anything. Why was Muzaka jumping to conclusions?

Raizel shook his head. Oh. So Muzaka had been right.

"Hmm, then what are we gonna do then? Because I have no idea how to use those weird machines in there. Do you?" Muzaka asked Raizel thoughtfully.

Raizel just shook his head again.

"Then what have you been doing this whole time you've been living with humans? You've been awake longer than I have!" Muzaka said in a teasing tone.

Raizel didn't answer. He just took another dignified sip of tea. Was this guy mute? And what in the world were they talking about? Their conversation didn't make any sense to her. How did these people not know how to use simple devices that could be found in almost any modern kitchen?

"Hey Lunark, do you know how to work those things?" Muzaka had turned toward Lunark now, gesturing to the kitchen.

"I have seen humans use them, but I myself have not," Lunark responded respectfully. Muzaka started complaining to no one in particular. Arien supposed he was just spoiled, though strangely he didn't seem all that upset. Maybe he was just one of those people who couldn't stand silence.

Well, whatever, at least she was right in assuming they weren't normal humans. Still didn't tell her what they _were_ , but every bit of information helps.

This was getting ridiculous though. She rolled my eyes at Muzaka's continued complaining and started walking toward the kitchen.

"What's up, Arien?" Muzaka asked.

"Well, I figured I'd start cooking something so we don't have to listen to any more of your whining. Is there anything in particular you guys want?" She turned around as she reached the kitchen, waiting for an answer.

Lunark was staring at her like Arien had just slapped her in the face. Muzaka just looked taken aback, and maybe even a bit offended. Hmm, had no one ever spoken to him like that? In that case, he had a really low bar to clear for getting offended. Hell, she hadn't even said anything mean. Surprisingly, though, it was Raizel who answered, speaking for the first time.

"Ramen."

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** So I've been having fun with Muzaka's and Arien's descriptions of each other, which are basically from the POV of Noblesse and Bleach respectively. Especially since both of them are so wrooonggg as far as their abilities go.

So, things like concealing one's energy are basic for Shinigami because they have predators (Hollows) that can and will kill them if they don't. But as I've read Noblesse, I realized that that's not really the case for Nobles and werewolves. Until very recently, Nobles and werewolves were the only ones capable of killing each other, but they had no real reason to, unlike why Hollows kill Shinigami. So why would they ever need to hide their energy? We've already seen a lot of evidence that neither werewolves nor nobles can sense others with greater than normal energy unless they're really close (like within a few dozen meters at most) like how Kentas didn't notice that he was being followed by Juraki, or how Rajak didn't notice the three ex-clan leaders until they attacked. That tells me that they never NEEDED to hide their energy from each other, because it didn't matter to them if someone sensed it. Now I know they're certainly _capable_ of hiding their energy, but it probably wouldn't be something they'd do while they're in their own house. I personally believe it's just a lack of practice, and I intend to address this later on in the story.

Also, since I'm assuming that the Bleach universe is the same as the Noblesse universe, I think that a werewolves' true form is a bit similar to an Arrancar's Resurrection, since it reveals the werewolves' true form and power. That's why Arien says they kinda feel a bit like Hollows.

Get ready to see other members of the household soon :)


	5. Chapter 5

Arien was sure she must've had an almost comical look of disbelief on her face.

 _Ramen?_

Out of every food he could have chosen, this classy man wanted _ramen_?

Was it just because he was in an Asian country, that he wanted the Asian experience? Because it was pretty clear that this man was not from South Korea. Or was it perhaps because he knew, or guessed, that she was from Japan, so he figured she knew how to make it? Well, lucky for him, she did. She was Japanese, ramen was practically in her DNA.

But it would still take a while, an hour and a half at least, and that was assuming these people had a pressure cooker and all the ingredients she needed. Which she was sure they didn't, because the only kind of ramen she knew how to make didn't have the ingredients one would see in normal ramen. Besides, the idea of making ramen did not appeal to her right now. It reminded her too much of home. He was just going to have to make do with something else. Returning her expression to a more neutral one, she turned back toward the kitchen.

"I doubt there are the correct ingredients here for the ramen I know how to make, so making ramen would take too long. I'll just make whatever I can find in the kitchen."

It was probably better not to ask what he wanted again. This way she could just make the quickest thing she could find. Arien opened the refrigerator to see what she had to work with.

It was a good thing she hadn't turned around to look at them, because Raizel looked devastated, and she was a sucker for guilt-trips.

To her surprise there had been a great number of ingredients in the fridge. Chicken, fish, pork, a large number of vegetables. The people that lived here must really like cooking. In the end she decided to fry up some fish with lemon, with a side of green beans and penne pasta. After all, she was pretty damn hungry at that point, and this was a simple meal that was also tasty. When she finished she infused the whole meal with reishi from the atmosphere, got everyone some iced water, and brought it over to the dining table.

Raizel sat at the head of the table with Muzaka to his left and Lunark beside him.

Lunark was still eyeing her and the food suspiciously.

Arien set the food down and told everyone to help themselves. She sat across from Muzaka and made sure to put a little bit of everything on her plate. Maybe that would help assuage Lunark's suspicions.

Everyone seemed lost in their own thoughts, and they ate in silence.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

Lunark didn't know what to think about this woman, whose name she had already forgotten. She was obviously human, and not a strong one at that. Yet she spoke as if she had no fear in the world. In the few minutes since they'd been introduced she had disrespected Muzaka-nim and denied the Noblesse his request. She had risked offending the two strongest people known to man! She was lucky she was just a weak human.

…. Was she weak, though? Lunark had been around humans for a very long time, arguably more so than any of her peers, and none of them acted like this woman. It wasn't just the careless statements – those could be attributed to ignorance, after all – it was the way she spoke, the way she moved, the general air she had about her. She spoke like someone who had complete confidence in herself. Her movements were smooth, purposeful, without any waste. Barely any human she had ever met, enhanced or otherwise, carried themselves with such complete certainty in their actions, not even the Third Elder. Not too long ago, she would have said there were _no_ humans who behaved in such a way. But that was before she had met Frankenstein.

And she knew what Frankenstein was capable of.

This woman sitting at the table with them was hiding something, and Lunark wanted to know what and why. So she began to eat her late dinner, expecting the worst.

The food had not been poisoned.

She had almost expected it to be, even though beings such as themselves would not easily be taken out by poisons created by humans. She hadn't even been that hungry, but she had to be sure, so she ate it.

The food had tasted fine, though. In fact, after she had finished, she felt better than she had since she had gotten here. She must've been hungrier than she thought. That was understandable. She'd been through a lot in the past few days.

Muzaka had eaten with gusto and the Noblesse had eaten with dignity, though he still looked a little sad that he hadn't gotten to eat ramen. Whatever ramen was. Probably a gourmet meal the Noblesse was accustomed to eating.

After everyone was finished (Muzaka-nim and Raizel-nim had both cleaned their plates as well, though thankfully they did not seem as if they had suffered any adverse effects), the woman got up, gathered everyone's plates, and headed toward the kitchen. Lunark followed her. She was not going to let the woman out of her sight. Muzaka-nim and Raizel-nim followed at a dignified pace.

The woman had started washing the dishes.

Upon seeing this, Muzaka-nim grinned and said to Raizel, "I guess she likes keeping things clean as much as Frankenstein, huh?"

The woman froze.

Lunark tensed.

Then the woman turned sharply and stared, eyes wide, at Muzaka-nim. Damnit, had she not known that Frankenstein was here? Did she have a grudge against him? Had she snuck in here to kill him and now thought her cover was blown? Muzaka-nim hadn't seen her reaction; he had turned away to lay back down on the couch, probably thinking that there had been nothing remise with his statement or the lack of response. The Noblesse was observing the woman with piercing eyes. Lunark prepared for her to show her true colors, whatever they were.

The woman opened her mouth as if to say something, closed it, shook her head slightly, turned back and started washing the dishes again.

Then the woman's head whipped around again, though this time she was just staring at the top half of the wall to her left. Her expression was one of concentration. Or was it confusion? The plate she had been washing sat forgotten in her hands.

What the hell was this woman doing? There was nothing there! Was she just crazy? After a few seconds of watching the woman stare at a blank wall, Lunark decided that it was time to get to the bottom of this. "What are you - ?" she began.

At that moment, Frankenstein, two enhanced humans, the werewolf-human kid, and the two silver-haired Nobles came quickly around the corner, all with grim expressions.

"We got company," declared the black-haired enhanced human without preamble. "There is a large group of people moving this way from the West, most of them werewolves from their energy signature, and they're not being subtle about it."


	6. Chapter 6

Werewolves?

Arien had only heard of werewolves a few times in her life, and she had never seen them in the Human World. She didn't know there _were_ werewolves in the Human World.

Were these people werewolves? If they were then they were very different from the werewolves she was aware of.

But no, that didn't make sense. Their auras were all different from each others. The two silver-haired children felt similar, as did Muzaka, Lunark, and the new grey-haired kid (Muzaka's son?). The other three were clearly humans, but they had the distinctive energy of a Hollow pulsating around them, far more so than Lunark and Muzaka. Raizel's aura was subtle, but definitely there, and if she had to put him in a group she guessed she'd put him with the silver-haired children.

So maybe just some of them were werewolves. Or maybe none of them were, since apparently they were about to go fight a bunch of them. But if some of them _were_ werewolves, she'd put her money on Muzaka and his group. Mainly because he just looked like someone who would be a werewolf. Not a very scientific reason, but she didn't have any solid facts to go on at this point.

By now Muzaka had stood up and was heading towards the door with a look that promised retribution. Raizel then rose from the couch.

"Master, you cannot come with us. You need to rest."

Arien couldn't help but notice how pained the blonde man looked as he said this. She glanced at the other people in the room, noticing looks of concern from almost everyone, especially the grey-haired man. Was Raizel sick? Also, ' _Master'_?

"There are many enemies." Raizel's face was calm.

"But Master - !" Blondie stopped speaking with a look from Raizel. Raizel held his gaze for a few more moments, then turned away gracefully. There was no bluster or arrogance in his actions, but his entire demeanor bespoke of someone who expected to be obeyed. Raizel must be pretty high up in whatever chain of command these people had.

As Raizel walked toward the door, Blondie followed respectfully. He stopped as he neared Muzaka and Lunark and handed them each an earpiece. "Put it in your ear," he said to Muzaka. "It will let us communicate with each other."

Earpieces? Really? Geez, she just could not get a good read on these people. Were they a part of a SWAT team or something? No one else made comment on the earpieces, so this must have been standard procedure for them. But then why did Muzaka require an explanation as to what it even was?

Seriously, what the hell was going on? Who were these people and who were they fighting?

She was starting to get annoyed.

Lunark took hers with a sour look. "Perhaps I should stay here." Arien didn't miss the significant glance Lunark threw at her.

You know, if she had wanted to kill anyone here, they'd be dead already, she thought. She understood Lunark's reasons, but her unguarded suspicions were pushing Arien past 'annoyed' and into 'pissed off'.

Blondie frowned. "M-21 is already staying here to protect the others, but if you think he requires protection…?" He let his sentence trail off as he looked between the two of us with an arched eyebrow.

The grey-haired man Arien assumed to be 'M-21' began shaking his head violently in the negative. Muzaka chimed in. "Don't worry, he can stay here with Arien." He smiled back at her as he beckoned for Lunark to follow him and disappeared out the door. What, did he think she would be lonely? Scared? Or was this kid supposed to be her babysitter?

The others were already following Muzaka. Blondie did not look too convinced (and she was sure her increasingly darkening expression did nothing to help sooth him), but he followed after Raizel and closed the door behind him.

So now she was alone with this kid, who was frowning at the door the others had just left through.

She turned her glare towards the dishes she was still washing instead of towards the guy – M-21.

M-21? Obviously some sort of code name.

Hmm, were all the names she'd been given code names?

Probably not. These people didn't seem cautious enough to have code names on hand in case a stranger showed up. They didn't even do a good job of hiding their energy.

By now she could assume that the four people downstairs were injured or otherwise unable to fight, since Blondie said M-21 was here to 'protect' them. There was a good chance that three (maybe five since two of the people downstairs felt like it) of them were werewolves, and another three had Hollows. The remaining members of the household were still a mystery, but there was no question as to them being more than human.

They had already given away this much information, why would they think code names would increase their security?

These people were a strange, motley crew.

And none of this answered the question as to what was going on here. The dishes in her hands were beginning to be in danger of shattering as she ran these questions through her head to no avail.

No, she shouldn't get upset. It didn't matter what they were or what was happening here, it had nothing to do with her. She finished the dishes while taking deep, calming breaths.

She could feel clashes of power off to the west. The battle must have started over there. Honestly she was very interested in this fight. Who was fighting who. What was fighting what. And why, of course. If se could witness them fighting she would be able to determine their abilities and hopefully discern what they were.

She had always been a very curious person, but it had been awhile since she had felt this strongly about discovering something. And maybe she could help with the fighting. Fighting was one of the few things she was good at, after all, and everyone enjoys doing what they are good at.

She turned toward the kid to tell him she was going to go help.

He was still staring at the door.

… Was he not as powerful as the others, was that why he was left behind? That would explain why he so strongly refused Lunark's adult supervision, and also why he was looking so resentfully toward the door the others had left through. But if that was the reason then why could she feel a great deal of power radiating throughout his body? Unless he didn't know how to control that power. She could empathize with that.

… Oh for the love of – !

There were people heading toward the house. Non-human people.

She could feel four different auras moving slowly in this direction, two from directly east of here, one moving from the northeast, and the last from the southeast.

Tch, so whatever was happening west of here was just a distraction. Or at least these four were using it as such. Were they with the people the other household members were fighting or were they just taking advantage of it? And who were _they_ anyway? This was so frustrating! She was not used to being in the dark while there was a fight going on. Going into a fight without any knowledge of the enemy was the epitome of asinine.

And she _was_ going to have to go into this fight, she realized. Partly because she had told herself she would find a way to repay these people for finding her and possibly saving her from being eaten by a random hollow, and this would probably cover that. Partly because she was definitely curious as to who all these people were, and they would probably just tell her if she helped them. But mostly because, well, she didn't have anything else to do. Might as well blow off some steam, especially since those four were almost here anyway.

She strode toward the door, startling M-21 from his reverie. She pushed the button she had seen the others push and wrenched it open. Good lord, the guy who owned this place must be loaded, she thought. There was an elegant eight-foot fence surrounding the whole property, complete with a tasteful wrought-iron gate. Ignoring the gate, she simply turned and jumped onto the roof of the mansion. She kept most of her senses focused on the four energies coming this way while also keeping tabs on what was happening around the area in case this was also a distraction. She was nothing if not careful.

M-21 landed beside her. Perfect. She could use this opportunity to discover a little about the situation before things got started.

"M-21, what can you tell me about these people's abilities and goals?" She gestured in the direction of the four people who were still stealthily moving toward them so he would know she meant these newcomers and not the opponents to the west.

A look of complete surprise and confusion appeared on his face.

Had he not sensed them? Well, they were moving while hiding their auras pretty well. Plus her energy sensing ability was something that she had honed for many, many years. So maybe it wasn't so strange that he hadn't sensed them. What _was_ strange was that the guy _still hadn't answered her._

"Oi, kid, there are four people headed this way so you better start talking, or these guys are gonna destroy us!" She didn't really believe that, since she could probably take on all these guys by herself, but he didn't know that. Besides, hubris was the number one killer in high-level battles, so it never paid to be too cocky. She really just wanted to scare this guy, because slow reactions were the number two killer. There is often no time to assess the situation in battle; you have to rely on your instincts and just react. And this kid wasn't reacting.

He turned to her with an angry expression on his face. He lifted his right hand, put it against this throat, and shook his head. From the way his fingers were curled it looked like he was trying to claw his own throat out.

He wasn't talking. He was trying to use sign language. A hand over his throat and a negative head shake.

The kid was mute.

He jumped into the air, hovering a few meters above the roof, looked at the house beneath them with a look of pure despair, and then transformed in an explosion of energy that shattered windows and tore shingles from the roof.

And then the enemy was around them.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** The werewolves that Arien knows about is Komamura's clan. I'm pretty sure he himself calls himself a werewolf in one of the later chapters.

And yeah, Arien has temporarily dubbed Frankenstein 'Blondie' since no one introduced them.

I couldn't really find a good place to mention it in this chapter, but rest assured Arien's reaction to the name 'Frankenstein' from last chapter will be explained eventually.

And finally, it looks like M-21 will have to apologize to the Chairman for messing up his house.


	7. Chapter 7

She instantly moved toward the kid and placed them back-to-back. She still didn't know what was going on, and she didn't know his fighting style or the enemies', but considering he had grown _claws_ she could at least assume he was a fighter. So back-to-back was definitely the best strategy for them to use against a larger number of enemies.

The four people were quick to use their numbers advantage against the two of them and move into a loose circle around them. Arien swiftly took stock of the enemy.

Behind her was a dark-skinned man with blonde hair and glasses. A large, bald man in a white tank top was on her left. To her right stood a short woman with red hair, a frilly black vest and matching skirt, and a pair of sandals with flowers on them. If it weren't for the psychopathic expression on her face Arien would assume this girl was a brat these other guys were babysitting. The man across from her was tall and expressionless, and was wearing a hakama with a top-knot-esque hairstyle and a katana on his back. Great, a samurai wannabe, she thought. This should be funny.

But she had chosen to fight him first because she was unaware of M-21's or the other enemies' abilities. This guy was the only one with visible weaponry – a weapon she happened to have a very generous amount of knowledge about – and therefore would likely be easy to defeat for her, freeing her up to fight the other three. People who fought with weapons like this were often completely reliant upon them and were usually complacent as well, so she did not think she would have any trouble with him.

The enemies seemed highly trained, and she could definitely feel a good deal of power from them, but it was not a threat to her. I would be able to win with little problem. Granted she still didn't know who or what these guys _were_ , but it was probably best to assume they were similar to the opponents she had fought in the past.

Her analysis of the enemy had only taken a few seconds, but she was confident in it. She had been doing this for a while.

However, that analysis only applied if she had been by herself. She had never really entered into battle alongside someone. She was kind of a lone wolf type. Partly because, well, she just didn't know that many people. But mostly because she did not know anyone who was strong enough to assist her _and_ withstand her power while doing so.

Would M-21 just get in the way? Would she need to protect him? Maybe she should just act as support instead of a tank, since he might already know these people and their abilities. Wait, maybe he could also handle these guys by himself. Was she even needed?

This was why she hated having a partner in battle, it made her think unnecessary things. Hell, she couldn't even get an answer to any of these questions since he was mute!

She kept her eyes on the opponents. She guessed she would really just be playing this one by ear.

It seemed the silence had gone on long enough for their opponents, and the blonde man behind her chose to speak.

"Ah, hello M-21. It pleases me to see you doing so well after all you just went through. Oh and it seems you have a guest. Hello over there, my name is Yuri." She glanced behind her and saw he was smiling.

His sincerity was about as fake as his smile.

The other three showed no sign of introducing themselves, and she sure as hell wasn't going to either, but before she could even tell him to fuck off she heard the woman shriek from her right.

"Yuri, why the hell are we making small talk? I want to get right to destroying this trash experiment who dared lay a hand on me. I'll show him what happens when you go against your betters."

What the hell did she just say? Experiment? How the hell did this bitch know a damn thing about her? Arien didn't know this woman from Eve, and she had certainly never 'laid a hand on her.'

Or was she talking about M-21? That must be it. Then was M-21 his experiment number, not a code name? It seemed she and M-21 had a lot in common.

She could tell that M-21 was getting tenser by the second and was probably going to snap at any moment. His power was fluctuating like crazy. Like she thought, he must be inexperienced in controlling his power. But not inexperienced enough to leap right into battle at the first sign of provocation, that was good. He must have at least _some_ battle experience. But the kid couldn't even talk, couldn't even retort to being called trash.

Hmm…

Arien started to laugh.

"Oh, honey," She smirked at her and glanced significantly at her clothes, "You should probably look in the mirror before you start calling anyone else 'trash.'

The woman just stood there with her mouth open. Arien savored the expression. She looked so foolish. It suited her.

M-21 threw a grateful smirk over his shoulder at her.

"WHAT DID THIS BTICH JUST SAY?"

Huh, she did not know someone's face could be that distorted. To be so easily provoked, she was like a damn child.

"Now, now, Dr. Aris, there's no need to be so upset, I'm sure Dr. Crombell would not mind if you brought this woman with you, as well as M-21. He knows you are always looking for new test subjects, after all, and this woman seems to have a lot of spirit."

"A test subject?" Arien blurted, mostly to herself. Were these people serious? They hadn't come here to fight, but to capture her and M-21 and make them into test subjects? What the hell was going on here? How dare they even think about making her and this kid into experiments? Especially since it seemed like both of them had already been victims of mad scientists.

Yuri decided to answer. As if any answer he could give would convince her not to destroy these people.

"Of course," he said, "Dr. Crombell and Dr. Aris are the best at physical modifications."

M-21 was shaking.

"And now that we were able to obtain the data from the werewolves and Ignes Kravei, our knowledge has been increased exponentially."

M-21 flinched slightly. A glance down showed blood flowing from between M-21's clenched fingers.

Dr. Aris must've noticed it as well.

"Ooh, does that touch a nerve, M-21? I notice you have nothing snarky to say. You know, I was wondering if the data we got about you from Ignes Kravei was true. I can see the advantage of trying to make a werewolf stronger than Muzaka-nim of course, but I didn't understand why she would cut out your tongue. I get it now though, and I must applaud her. Now I don't have to take any of your insubordinate lines while I have you. In fact, I think I'll do the same to this woman for what she said to me."

Someone… had cut out this kid's _tongue_? Just _because_?

No.

Fuck these people. These people could not just do as they please with the lives and freedoms of others.

She would not allow it.

How _dare_ they think that they had or have _any_ right to destroy a part of this man's life. To _keep_ destroying his life.

She created a barrier around them that would protect the surrounding humans and reached her hand up toward the sealed form of her zanpakuto.

These monsters were going to die here.

But first, M-21 needed his tongue back.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

M-21 had never been what anyone would call 'verbose', but now he had never wanted to speak so badly.

The woman had covered his back as soon as the assassination squad had shown up, so she must have at least a little battle experience, but still, she shouldn't be here! _And he couldn't tell her to run!_

He already knew he could defeat three of these people, and this time there was no Muzaka-nim to save their asses. Plus that was before he had gotten all that power from Ignes Kravei's experiments. So much extra power, in fact, that he was having difficulty controlling it even now. But hopefully he would be able to use it to defeat these people without losing himself. And without damaging Frankenstein's house _too_ much.

He was pretty confident in his ability to defeat these people. Which just left the woman, whose name was apparently Arien. But there was nothing he could do to get her to hide and leave this to him.

Tch.

He would just have to defeat them while protecting her. With any luck she will retreat somewhere safe once she realizes she's in over her head.

Yuri was the first to talk. As usual. The typical fake smile and greeting. Aris's freak out about what he had said and done a while ago was also expected. She was so used to people being subservient that apparently she could not stand it when someone she thought someone who was weak was uppity with her. Typical Union mindset.

Even though it was expected, it still pissed him off.

Arien calling Aris trashy was _not_ expected, however. Though it was definitely appreciated, since he couldn't reply with a smart-ass comment.

He smirked at her.

He was starting to be glad she had stayed if she was gonna keep it up with the trash talking.

It was too bad Yuri was able to calm Aris down. He would have enjoyed destroying her confidence in her strength one more time even if they hadn't apparently been planning on bringing him in to be her test subject.

"A test subject?" He heard Arien say behind him, sounding almost more like a statement than a question. Damn. She was probably really scared. The weaker modified humans were just guinea pigs, to be used and disposed of. He would know. If she had managed to escape before, there was no way she wouldn't be scared of these guys bringing her back in.

He started shaking with the combined need to defeat these guys so they would never be able to use the weak as test subjects and for insinuating that they were the most intelligent people the world had ever seen. Crombell just went around stealing Frankenstein's research, he was a fraud!

Not to mention Crombell had apparently also stolen the data from the lab he had been in with the werewolves. He knew that the amount of cruelty and wasted lives that had gone on there was staggering. Who knew what these monsters would do with that information? He felt blood trickle down his hands and realized his claws had dug into his hands, but it didn't matter.

It didn't matter that he had Ignes' data. Or Frankenstein's data. Because he was going to kill them all this time, 'truce' be damned. In fact, hopefully that would bring Crombell himself here. Then he could kill him to. For all the pain they had caused him, his comrades, Frankenstein, and Rai-nim, these people were going to die.

He couldn't roar, but he bared his teeth and crouched, ready to attack.

Before he could, a yellow energy barrier started spreading all around them.

At first, he thought it was those modified werewolf twins. It did look similar after all, in that it was box-shaped instead of the spherical ones the Nobles preferred.

But this one was yellow.

And those werewolf women weren't alive anymore.

And he had never seen Aris, Yuri, or fake-M-24 use something like this. That left the guy with the sword or Arien.

He looked behind him in time to see Arien reach up to her chest and pull the weird symbol she had there, breaking the strange metal connectors that attached it to her clothes.

The amount of energy that followed this action was staggering.

It wasn't an explosion. He was used to explosions of energies, what with being around Frankenstein and seeing more than his fair share of Union Elders. This was more like he had been transported to somewhere deep in the ocean. It was relatively calm, but the pressure was suffocating.

This woman was capable of so much power? This was probably on par with Frankenstein's energy. And she hadn't even _done_ anything yet! How had he not noticed? How had she hidden all this energy?

Wait, had that symbol been kind of like Rai-nim's earring? Was it a seal that controlled her immense power?

She also seemed to have Rai-nim's ability to change her clothes, he noted as she turned towards him.

Her whole uniform had changed. Now she wore a black dress with thin silver and light blue lines that swirled and twisted all around the garment. The sleeves were a little longer than her arms and very large, while also leaving her shoulders bare. It was held up by a loop around her neck, and had two slits up each of her legs. Underneath there was a white dress that could be seen through the slits in her black dress and from behind the loop of fabric keeping her dress up, while still leaving her shoulders bare.

More importantly, though, _why did she have a soul weapon?!_

In her hand she now held a long, sleek looking, slightly curved sword with a bright white blade that was intricately patterned with pale blue lines. The guard was solid black and kind of resembled a five-spoked wheel. The handle was also solid black with a silver symbol hanging by a short chain from the end that was similar to the shape of the guard, only smaller.

Aside from the colors, it looked exactly like what a Noble clan leader would have as a soul weapon.

Except all the Noble clan leaders were accounted for. And we had just found her off the coast. It wasn't like she was a long lost Noble who dropped by to visit.

 _Who the hell was this woman?_

She looked passively at each of the four people around us. As she did, the pressure she was exuding began to decrease around him, while at the same time obviously increasing around each of the others. As her eyes fell on each of them, they collapsed onto their knees, apparently unable to withstand the incredible amount of energy she was focusing onto them.

She was making them kneel.

Was she some distant relative of Rai-nim's and nobody had told him, he thought wildly.

She was now completely facing him again, and he braced himself. Was it his turn now? She held her sword out to the side and he tensed.

"Awaken," Arien intoned with a glance at the sword in her hand.

No attack came, but the sword changed shaped and color.

Now the blade was a bit shorter and was colored a normal silver. The handle was black still, but there were a few small, red decorations on it.

What the _hell_?

Could soul weapons _evolve_?

M-21 was pretty sure his mouth was hanging wide open at this point, but he just couldn't bring himself to care enough to close it.

Arien didn't seem to be surprised by his shocked reaction. A small, sad smile appeared on her face.

And then her power spiked as what appeared to be the torso of an enormous woman rose up behind her. He had never seen anything like it, but the closest thing he could compare it to was the manifested form of Death Scythe.

But Arien wasn't a fucking clan leader, and that wasn't a fucking soul weapon. But it sure as hell didn't feel like the Union's first attempt at creating their own soul weapon, like Dark Spear. This thing felt completely stable.

He couldn't make any sense of this.

"Keep your mouth open," Arien told him.

Before he could even register her words, the arms of the thing behind her moved toward him with incredible speed.

What the - ! He could feel it in his mouth! What was it doing?!

And then it was gone.

He didn't think he had ever been so confused. He stared at where it had been. Then he stared at Arien.

She was staring back at him.

"How is your tongue?" she asked, her tone similar to Frankenstein's when he was asking them to tell him about their conditions.

His tongue? He didn't _have_ \- !

Huh. He had a tongue again.

He moved it around in his mouth, marveling at the feel of it. It really hadn't been that long since that sadistic woman had cut it out of him, but it seemed to him like it had been a lifetime.

"Can you talk now?" Arien was still waiting on him to answer.

"Y-yes," he managed to force out. He could talk! But how? Had she really been able to regrow his tongue? How?! What the hell had that thing been?! A healing soul weapon?

While he was still trying to figure out what the hell had just happened, Arien turned to their opponents who were still being kept on their knees and who looked about as confused as he did. Though they also looked scared. He didn't blame them. Whoever or whatever she was, she was obviously on his side right now. So they were her enemies, too.

She smiled coldly at them. Then she moved.

She left an afterimage where she had been, moving behind all four opponents in the blink of an eye. All four of them disappeared, a weird symbol taking their place.

And they were dead.

Just like that.

"Tch. Probably should have given them slower deaths, but I still haven't recovered. Figured I should probably take things slow."

He gaped at her. His mouth opened and closed a few times before he finally settled on a snarky reply.

"That was you taking things _slow_?" She had destroyed them in less than a second! There wasn't even any bodies left.

She smirked at him as she waved her arm toward the barrier and caused it to shatter.

The barrier must have been keeping the others' energies from reaching them as well. He could still feel several people fighting, including Muzaka-nim. But what made his stomach drop and his blood freeze was that he could also feel Rai-nim's energy.

And it was almost gone.


	8. Chapter 8

Her zanpakutou had no problem killing those four people.

Not entirely unexpected, of course, since spiritual weapons and beings could interact with the Human World. She guessed this was just the first time she had used my powers on a non-spiritual being, so she hadn't been completely sure.

It also seemed likely that these people had never encountered a Shinigami with a shikai before. M-21 had acted completely dumbfounded when he saw her abilities (though he was still able to make a quip about them). Maybe he had never seen a Shinigami. They weren't exactly a dime-a-dozen in the Human World. That would explain why everyone seemed to think she was weak - they just didn't know what to look for.

Or maybe they just didn't associate her clothing with that of a Shinigami. It _was_ pretty non-standard. Now really wasn't the best time to confirm this new theory, though.

Removing the barrier, she sensed that there were still several people fighting to the west. They had mentioned that their opponents were numerous.

But there were also people here that M-21, and by extension she, was supposed to be protecting. They couldn't just –

M-21 uttered a strangled cry and rushed off in the direction of the fight.

It took her a moment to realize why. Raizel's energy was disappearing.

Hmmm.

Well, shit.

What to do now.

On the one hand, she could follow him. She knew several healing techniques that could be helpful depending on the severity of Raizel's wounds. On the other hand, there were already wounded people here with no one to guard them.

There were a rather large number of people in this house and they seemed quite used to combat. They _had_ to have a healer. M-21 was clearly not a healer, but surely their healer was one of the people that was already over there. Unless they didn't have a healer. Or the wounds were too severe.

She extended her energy-sensing range to its maximum. There were no other auras present besides the ones to the west. The people in the house were unlikely to be attacked, whereas there could be people dying that she could be helping right now. If someone _did_ head towards the house, she was confident she could intercept before any damage was inflicted on the ones inside the house.

She briefly toyed with the idea of just leaving. She _had_ helped them already, so it wasn't like she really owed them anything anymore. But she knew she couldn't do that. If there was someone that she could help, she would.

With her decision made she leapt after M-21.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

M-21 hadn't made a conscious decision to join the others, but he found himself moving at his fastest speed toward Rai-nim and his comrades.

Rai-nim had been so weakened after his fight with Ignes Kravei. A fight he only entered into because M-21 hadn't been strong enough to avoid capture. Even though he had worked so damn hard to ensure that Rai-nim would never have to use his life force. He snarled and gritted his teeth. If anything happened to Rai-nim it would be his fault. He had to make sure he was alright.

He could feel the other's auras quiet down. The fighting must have stopped. He pushed himself even harder, using every ounce of speed his improved powers could give him.

When he arrived he almost wished he hadn't come.

The ground was covered in the broken bodies of what must've been those anti-clan leader weapons the others had told him about. All of his comrades had been injured, and it looked like Takeo had lost an eye. Their injuries did not seem to bother them. They were all surrounding something. Closer inspection told him that it was Frankenstein. Frankenstein was on his knees, blood oozing from a number of open wounds.

In his arms he held Rai-nim.

M-21 walked forward numbly.

Rai-nim was bleeding from the mouth, nose, eyes, and ears. His breathing was shallow and quick. He was not conscious.

No. No, this couldn't be happening. He looked around wildly at his comrades, as if someone was going to tell him this wasn't real. Regis met his eyes. He was very pale. And he was crying. So were Tao and Takeo. Muzaka appeared to be in shock. Everyone else just looked haunted and helpless.

Frankenstein! He turned back toward Frankenstein. Surely Frankenstein knew what to do, could heal him. Frankenstein could heal anyone!

Frankenstein's head was bowed over his Master. His shoulders were shaking and his breaths were coming in short gasps. It took M-21 a few seconds to realize that Frankenstein was weeping.

Then there was no hope. If Frankenstein couldn't save him, who could?

He began to cry.

Arien landed softly next to him.

Arien. Strange powers. Killed their enemies. Grew his tongue back. Healed him. _Healed_.

He whipped his head towards her so fast it hurt.

"Can you save him? Please. Can you save him?" He was whispering. And crying. And begging. But he didn't care. In the past this would have made him ashamed to show such weakness, to ask, to beg a complete stranger to help him. Not anymore. He just wanted Rai-nim to be safe and happy and _alive_. It was because of Rai-nim that he could now ask for something without feeling ashamed just _for needing help_. If there was even the slightest chance that this strange woman could save Rai-nim, he would get on his hands and knees and kiss her bare feet if she wanted him to.

From the corner of his eye he saw every head turn toward him in shock. Almost every head. Frankenstein seemed beyond registering those around him.

But M-21 didn't meet their eyes. He was looking at Arien.

Arien looked at him and his comrades with sad eyes. Then she looked down at Rai-nim and Frankenstein for a long second that felt like an eternity. When she finally looked up again her face carried all the sadness in the world.

"I will do what I can."

She strode forward with purposeful grace and kneeled down across from Frankenstein.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

"Sir, could you please place him on the ground so I can examine him." Arien kept her voice sharp and clinically detached like they taught you in the 4th Division.

Blondie just stared at her. She reached forward to take Raizel from him. That got a reaction. Though not the one she needed.

His hands tightened on Raizel and his eyes narrowed. It seemed like he was about two seconds away from attacking her. He didn't seem to be of sound mind. She could empathize. But still.

She took a deep breath.

"Sir, in order for me to help Raizel I need to place a barrier around him that increases the amount of energy around us. If you are in the barrier with us your soul will begin absorbing that energy subconsciously in order for you to heal your own wounds. In other words, if you insist on holding him while I try to help him you will decrease his chances of survival." She spoke slowly, enunciating every word and making sure to keep eye contact.

Before she had finished M-21 had moved behind Blondie and placed his hand on his shoulder.

"It's alright, she's trying to save him, she's trying to save Rai-nim, she can heal people, she might be able to heal him." He was obviously trying to be soothing and convincing, but the rushed sentences gave away his urgency.

Blondie stared at M-21 for a few moments. Then at her. Then at Raizel.

He nodded and gently placed Raizel on the ground. M-21 quickly helped him up and moved back a few steps.

She removed the Quincy crest from her zanpakutou and tossed it in the air a few feet above her head. Simultaneously she wove a few kidou into a hemisphere around herself and Raizel and anchored them to the crest, locking it in place above the two of them. Immediately a pale blue colored hemisphere appeared around she and Raizel.

"Right now I am creating the barrier that will gather energy from the atmosphere and concentrate that energy within the barrier, similar to how a magnifying glass can concentrate the light from the sun," she explained to the others. It was always best to explain any medical procedure being done, especially with how dire the situation was and how little they knew her. Not to mention that her abilities were a complete unknown to them, even if they did know about Hollows and Shinigami, so it was definitely going to look foreign to them.

Better keep things simple.

"The increase in unattached energy around us will allow his soul to absorb it more efficiently as well as assist me in determining his diagnosis. I will now begin assessing his health by placing my hands above his body. This healing method allows me to gradually insert energy into his soul. You will see my hands glow a soft white, but it is not dangerous."

She quickly stretched her hands out and closed her eyes, letting her spiritual energy spread to the palm of her hands in the healing kidou she was all too familiar with.

Jesus Christ, this was worse than she thought. How was this man still breathing?

His body was a wreck. The external wounds he did have were small, just scratches really, but most of his internal organs were heavily degraded, hence the bleeding from the mouth. How could his internal organs be damaged if there aren't even any signs of external damage? There were no signs that anything had been healed. Even the small scratches hadn't healed yet.

It was his soul that truly concerned her, however. This man was obviously not human, for many reasons. But there were enough similarities between them that she could still say with confidence that this man should be dead already.

His soul hadn't been shattered; it had been _decimated_. If she could compare it to anything, actually, it resembled what had happened to this area they were standing in. It was obvious what it had once been, but now it was unrecognizable.

What little was left of his soul was using all its energy just trying to keep itself from collapsing. It simply did not have any energy to spare to even _think_ about rebuilding itself.

If he were a Shinigami, she would have assumed he had been horribly wounded in battle and his soul had collapsed as a result. That's what happened when a Shinigami was on the brink of death.

But this man was not outwardly injured. He was just dying.

Unless… Unless this man relied on his _soul_ to live, not his body. If that were the case, then any damage done to him during battle would be reflected on his _soul_ , not his body. And the damage to his soul would be reflected by his physical body, like how the damage to a Shinigami's body was reflected by his soul.

That would explain why this man was so severely injured internally, and why he was bleeding from so many orifices. The internal damage to his body was the direct reflection of the damage to his soul.

But if that was the case, why were the others who felt similar to him fine? Why was this man unique? Did they possess a healing ability that he did not? I had felt earlier that his power was immense. Perhaps they have similar regenerative abilities but the baseline of his power is exponentially greater than the others, so the amount of energy he was expending far exceeded what he was able to absorb?

Or perhaps he was simply different.

It seemed she could empathize with many of these people.

Throughout this rationalization she had kept up the healing kidou. Completely restoring his energy with this method was out of the question, she quickly realized, but she could probably restore a good portion of it. Even though she was able to use energy from the atmosphere it still required energy to gather it, and keep up the kidou around them, and the healing kidou, and her own energy that she was inserting into him. She wouldn't be able to keep it up long enough even in her unsealed state, especially since she hadn't recovered yet herself.

But if she could insert all the energy she could and he regained consciousness, then that meant that his soul was strong enough to survive the more direct method she had of restoring energy. His soul was too damn fragile for her to try that method right now. It could tear it apart to try it now. But if he heals enough to regain consciousness then she would know he would be capable of withstanding the more direct method. If after this he didn't regain consciousness, she wouldn't be able to save him. This healing kidou was just a way to help him help himself. So she would continue inserting energy for as long as she possibly could. The rest would be up to him.


	9. Chapter 9

Frankenstein carried his Master back to the house in his arms.

Well, back to what was left of the house. He did his best to ignore the broken shingles and debris in the yard and tried not to focus on the small, reflective pieces of glass that seemed to be everywhere throughout the house.

He was already distraught, there was no need to make it worse. The repercussions would come later. Right now he had far more important matters that required his attention.

Like how his Master had almost certainly been a few scant minutes away from eternal sleep.

He shook his head and glanced down. Whatever else had happened, Master was safe and alive in his arms at the moment and that was all that mattered. Dwelling on what could have happened would accomplish nothing. There was far too much at stake. He could not afford to lose himself to his base emotions again.

He turned his thoughts elsewhere to distract himself.

The fight had obviously been a ploy to target his Master. The opponents were similar to the anti-clan leader technology, but these had been injected with the energy of werewolves in a manner that resembled what had been done to M-21. Ignes's idea, no doubt. But Ignes was dead, which made it abundantly clear that someone had usurped her data and launched a wide-scale frontal attack on them in order to draw them out.

And once they had drawn them out, the enemy had proceeded to separate himself and Muzaka completely from the group at great sacrifice to their side in order to ensure that the two of them would not be able to come to the aid of the others who became similarly surrounded.

And the rest ruthlessly targeted his Master.

Master was the Symbol of Power. He did not dodge any attack. For him to dodge the attack of an enemy was an offense of power, and was therefore something that Master would not do. Even if blocking attacks cost him his precious life. He also could not let those who had harmed those under his care escape. That was his duty as Noblesse, as he would say.

So even though no one would have judged him, or looked down on him, or thought any less of him had he simply allowed us to take care of all the weapons while he kept himself safe, Master continued using his life until there was almost nothing left.

But Master had, miraculously, been saved by the young woman they had found. Who had also apparently restored the damage done to M-21. And he had no idea how she had done it. He could only hope she would let him study her healing abilities.

He made his way down to the basement so that Raizel could sleep in his makeshift sanctuary. Afterwards he headed back to the others. He knew they had been right behind him, and he knew where they had gone. Raizel hadn't been the only one injured, after all.

Every head turned towards him as he walked into the lab. He smiled reassuringly as he washed his hands and donned surgical gloves. He knew what they were silently asking.

"Do not worry. Master's state seems to be stable. I have placed him in his sanctuary so he can recover as efficiently as possible." He heard several sighs of relief and saw several nods and even smiles.

"Whew! I have never been so scared in all my life!" Tao, ever the group's spokesperson, exclaimed, hand over his heart. "Now can someone explain to me what's going on?!" He flailed his arms about as if to emphasize his confusion. "I don't like being in the dark! I want to know everything!"

That raised an excellent question.

"Where is the young lady?" he demanded. They knew who he was talking about.

Tao snapped to attention. "Well, once we got here Miss Arien said she was tired, so I didn't feel right pestering her with questions after all she did for us. She started heading back towards the recovery room but I showed her to one of the spare rooms. I figured it was only right to treat her with utmost hospitality."

So her name was Arien. Tao must have asked Muzaka, though more than likely it was M-21 he has asked. But it certainly wouldn't hurt to make her feel as comfortable as possible. He did not know her motivations for helping them as of yet, but regardless she had saved his Master, and for that he would make sure she had everything she wanted for as long as she stayed under his roof. Her having her own bedroom would simplify matters.

"Excellent work, Tao." Tao beamed and saluted before settling into a more comfortable position for someone who was injured.

"Now, since it seems that we will have to wait for Miss Arien to rest," he deliberately let his smile turn from innocent to dangerous, "why doesn't M-21 fill in some of the gaps?"

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** Sorry guys, know this is a really short chapter, been having a hard time finding time to really sit down to plan/write. I will try to make it up to y'all some time soon!


	10. Chapter 10

When Rai awoke he was in his casket. It was with little effort that he opened the top and stepped out.

His head turned as a soft chime drew his attention. He turned to face his Bonded when he bowed.

"Frankenstein." He acknowledged.

"Master." Frankenstein intoned, straightening from his bow. "It is good to see you up."

 _To see him up?_ He knew his life force would have been severely depleted after their latest fight. Only a very long sleep would have allowed him to recover from such a wound. He felt a sliver of dread slip into his soul.

"How long have I been asleep?"

"Only a few hours." Frankenstein had sensed his alarm and was quick to reassure him. "How are you feeling?"

He felt fine.

"I am fine."

Frankenstein nodded, relief and happiness flashing across their connection.

Frankenstein fell in step behind him as he moved toward the elevator that would take him into the inhabited area of the house.

"Are the others well?" he asked as the elevator began to ascend.

"Almost everyone was injured during the fight. The severity ranged from relatively mild to moderate. However, there were no life-threatening injuries," a brief spike of horrible sorrow and loss across the connection, causing Rai's eyes to sadden, "and everyone is expected to make a full recovery. The only permanent damage inflicted was the loss of Takeo's right eye. At the moment everyone is awake, including Kentas, Miss Garda, Rael and Karias, and are awaiting you in the living room."

He nodded. He did not like hearing of the injuries that the other's received because he had not been able to protect them, but he was at least glad to hear that they were doing well.

When the elevator door opened he walked with Frankenstein to the living room. Living with so many people was still a novelty to him, especially when so many faces turned and smiled at him when he entered. Tao even cheered.

"Hey, Raizel," Muzaka greeted him with a smile, "good to see you up again." He patted an empty space next to him on one of the couches.

Raizel sat down and was promptly handed a cup of tea by Seira. He savored the smell for a moment before taking a sip and enjoying the peace and quiet.

"Okay, now that Raizel's here, can we please discuss what happened?" Muzaka demanded loudly.

Rai sighed.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

Frankenstein was surprised, but very relieved, when he felt the slight pressure on his connection that informed him his Master had awakened. He quickly wrapped up the examinations of the four who had been unconscious during the fight, requested that they join the others upstairs in the living room, and informed them that he'd be there shortly.

When he arrived downstairs his Master was facing him. Frankenstein moved his right arm across his body and bowed at the waist until his Master acknowledged him.

"Master, it is good to see you up," he said as he straightened from his bow. He saw his Master furrow his brow ever so slightly and felt a brief welling of sadness from his Master, and instantly realized how ambiguous his words were and how his Master had misinterpreted them.

He informed his Master of such. While he did he studied his Master a little more closely. It might have only been the lighting, or wishful thinking, but his Master _did_ look a little healthier, his skin less pale and the circles under his eyes gone.

Master said that he felt fine, which was his usual response when Frankenstein asked that question so as not to worry him, but the very fact that Master was awake so soon after his collapse was a good indicator that perhaps at least _some_ of the damage done to his soul had been repaired.

But his Master, of course, had very little interest in his own health and only worried about others. Frankenstein recounted the conditions of the other household members as the elevator rose and finally opened onto the first floor of the house.

He was happily satisfied with the reactions of the others as his Master entered the room, from the newest member's respectful nods to the smiles of the older members. And, of course, Tao had to be the most exuberant.

Most everyone was standing, as there really wasn't enough seats for everyone in the house anymore. One couch was occupied by Regis, Seira, and Takeo, whose ruined eye had been cleaned and neatly bandaged. Rael sat on the single-person seat facing the kitchen (no doubt so that he would be close to Miss Seira). Tao, M-21 and Karias were all grouped loosely behind the second couch. Muzaka was sitting in the middle of the other couch by himself, Miss Garda, Lunark and Kentas all standing behind him. Apparently no one felt brave enough to sit next to the previous Werewolf Lord.

Muzaka greeted his Master and Master sat down next to him, graciously accepting a cup of tea from Miss Seira. Frankenstein nodded his approval as he moved closer toward the kitchen, glad to see that Miss Seira had had the foresight to make tea for everyone so that there would be some for his Master. Rael and Karias must have guessed that the reason Frankenstein had left was to go greet his Master and had relayed this to the room so they would be prepared for the Noblesse's arrival.

"Okay, now that Raizel's here, can we please discuss what happened?" Muzaka was the one to break the silence with a loud question.

Frankenstein sighed along with his Master. M-21 hadn't been able to tell them what had transpired in their absence because Kentas and Rael had started waking up, and their injuries and well-being took precedent. Karias woke up not long after, and between treating everyone's wounds and his own the atmosphere had not been conducive to an interrogation. Afterwards, when everyone's injuries had been cleaned and bandaged, he sent everyone to get some rest and enforced this rule by following each person to their respective rooms and making sure they laid down. Discussion of what had happened would lead to nowhere, and they needed a few hours' rest at least. He was not going to let his own curiosity blind him to his priorities.

Frankenstein turned to face M-21.

"M-21, now that everyone's here, can you please inform us of what occurred while we were away? Please be as specific as possible, regardless of how small or strange the details are."

M-21 nodded, looking slightly uncomfortable to be in the spotlight.

"I don't really know what happened. There's not all that much I can tell you besides what I saw." He took a deep breath and began.

"Not long after you guys left, Yuri, Aris, and the guy that can take the form of M-24 showed up – "

"Mark," Muzaka interrupted. "That guy's name is Mark, he can take the form of other people somehow."

Everyone looked at Muzaka.

"Muzaka. Could you _not_ interject with irrelevant comments and let M-21 finish?" His charming smile was somehow eclipsed by the dark aura emanating from him.

Muzaka turned to look at him with a slight scowl, before shrugging and turning back towards M-21.

Master sighed, slightly exasperated with their antagonistic behavior towards each other.

Frankenstein quickly stopped his power from leaking out before turning to M-21.

"M-21, please continue."

M-21 looked warily between Frankenstein and Muzaka before starting again.

"Well, the three of them showed up, as well as another guy I didn't recognize." M-21 scowl turned into a frown.

"Before they even arrived, though, she must have sensed them, because she left the house and leapt onto the roof. I didn't know what she was doing, or what her intentions were, so I followed her up there. She started asking me about their abilities, probably so she could have more information in case of a fight, but I hadn't sensed them yet, so I didn't know what she was talking about. Not that I could have answered even if I had," he added as an afterthought, his scowl starting to return.

"When they arrived I transformed. At that point I didn't know she could fight, so I assumed she would hide and I would fight all four of them. But instead she put herself at my back."

"They didn't say anything new, besides alluding to the fact that they had come here for me, though they were probably after Frankenstein's data again as well. Apparently they had already gotten at least some of Ignes Kravei's data." His expression darkened.

"But right after they mentioned that, she must have gotten really angry. Her power started to increase, and I saw her reach up and break that symbol she had on her chest. When she did the amount of energy I could feel from her went from almost nothing to almost suffocating. It was dense enough to prevent all four of the assassination squad members from moving."

M-21 paused for a moment and shifted slightly.

"This is where it gets hard to explain, and I don't think you guys are going to believe me if I tell you."

M-21 spent his time almost exclusively around the upper echelons of Nobility and enhanced humans. What did he see that he truly didn't think they would believe him?

"Don't worry about it, M-21. Just tell us what you saw. I don't believe we'll be able to understand the full story without an explanation from Miss Arien herself, but it would be nice if we were at least all on the same page." That way everything they knew would be on the table.

M-21 frowned. He appeared to debate how to proceed, then let out a sigh.

"Fine. After she released her power, her outfit completely changed. And she had a sword in her hand. A white sword with a black handle. I don't know where she got it from. It wasn't like she'd been wearing it all that time. Then she kind of glanced down at it and said, 'Awaken.' And then the sword _changed_."

"It wasn't a big change, but the blade shrank a bit and the color definitely changed." M-21 brow had furrowed as he recalled what happened. He huffed, his expression angry. "And then, a woman appeared behind her. Well, it was really only the top half of a woman."

M-21 let out a frustrated sigh as he looked at them and struggled to explain.

"I don't really know how else to describe it. The only thing I could compare it to was seeing the manifested form of Seira's Death Scythe."

Frankenstein saw Rael bristle, but even Rael was wise enough not to interrupt.

"That's not even an accurate comparison," M-21 continued, "but it's the best I've got. It was about 12 feet tall, and just appeared out of nowhere right behind Arien."

"Then she made it move or something, because next thing I know its arm is outstretched towards me and I can feel something moving in my mouth. It didn't hurt, it was just weird, and a bit uncomfortable."

M-21 shrugged.

"And my tongue had been restored or regrown or whatever she had done, and I could talk again. After that she killed all four of the assassinations squad members within a second. I couldn't even follow her, so I don't know what she did to them, but each one of their bodies kind of transformed before disappearing completely. I don't really know much else since after that I headed towards where you guys were and she followed."

M-21 glared around the room from beneath his bangs and shrugged again.

The room was silent. It was clear that the room did not doubt what M-21 had seen but at the same time he could see that most of the room was having a hard time wrapping their minds around what he had told them.

"Huh." Muzaka spoke, hand scratching the back of his head. "And that doesn't even take into account how she restored at least some of Raizel's life force. I know the world has changed, but I've never heard of anything like that. Hey, Frankenstein, what about you?"

All eyes turned towards Frankenstein. Frankenstein shook his head and pushed his glasses higher up on his nose.

"I can only hypothesize what abilities she possesses, not give a conclusive report, especially with how diverse her abilities seem to be. Based on what we know she was capable of restoring M-21's tongue in less than a minute, an organ that should have taken days to repair itself, if at all, since Ignes went to considerable effort to ensure it could not regenerate. She was also able to restore Master's life force to some degree. Now it seems she has a significant detection range, combat experience and something that resembles a soul weapon."

"Any single one of these powers would require significant training and prowess. So far the only proven method of restoring my Master's power was with the soul of a Noble, the soul of a pureblood Noble Lord. Miss Arien has impressive control of unknown, dangerous and useful skills. She's obviously not a low-level agent that either managed to escape from the Union or was discarded."

He paused as he considered the implications of such an enhanced human. The closest comparison would be someone like himself, someone with both combat and healing (so to speak) abilities. Yet nothing the Union had produced indicated that they were competent enough to create such a being. And if they had created such a being, why hadn't they seen her before? How had she escaped? Surely they would have implanted a failsafe, like Crombell had done with Muzaka?

"I thought she might have been an experiment of someone trying to create a soul weapon, like Dark Spear," M-21 stated. Frankenstein had informed the RK about the origins of Dark Spear when Tao and Takeo underwent the experiment to obtain some of its powers. Knowing what had been done to those souls might make their pain a little easier to bear.

Lunark crossed her arms, her brow furrowed thoughtfully. "Who could have made her though? The only remotely competent scientists the Union possessed were the 9th Elder, Ignes Kravei, and Crombell. Crombell was by far the youngest scientist they had who specialized in enhancement, and he had far less knowledge about Nobles than the 9th Elder or Ignes, so I doubt it was him. The 9th Elder and Ignes worked closely together, but Ignes is my best guess, since she likely had the most knowledge and experience experimenting on Nobles. It's not too far-fetched to think that she experimented on Cetus even before she inherited it. Perhaps the commotion with Ignes and the werewolves allowed this woman to escape."

"Arien," Takeo said quietly. "Her name is Arien." M-21 and Muzaka nodded. Regardless of who she was, Takeo clearly thought Miss Arien deserved not to be called 'this woman.'

Lunark eyed him for a moment, before giving a nod that conveyed both agreement and apology.

"Even if we assume she is a successful copy of a Noble with a soul weapon, that still doesn't explain how she was able to restore Rai-nim's life force!" Tao looked around the room earnestly. "I mean, yeah, a Noble's soul was able to restore some of Rai-nim's life force, but only through the power and, uh, foresight of the Previous Lord through the Lord's soul weapon. Arien didn't even use her soul weapon, if that's even what it is, to help Rai-nim, and from what she said she mostly used energy from all around us. What kind of technique is that? Is that something that can be implanted? Enhanced?"

Frankenstein turned around to begin fixing his Master and the rest of the household some ramen for as a late-night snack before responding.

"The ability to absorb energy from the surrounding atmosphere is an ability that all sentient beings share. Like breathing, it is involuntary and something we do not need to think about to do, though efficiency can be increased with enhancements and training. Werewolves are by far the most naturally efficient at this process – it's one of the reasons why their regeneration rate is better than a Nobles' or a humans'. The more efficiently you can absorb energy from the atmosphere, the more quickly your body can use it to heal your wounds."

"But physically transferring energy to another being is another matter entirely. Even if the energy she was transferring came exclusively from the atmosphere, she had to have been using herself as a medium for that energy, in addition to having some sort of technique or innate ability that allowed her to transfer said energy into another's soul. I have seen no evidence of any being possessing such an ability."

Frankenstein heard the sound of someone clearing their throat from behind him.

"Well, at least I'm not the only one confused about what's going on."

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** Writing from Rai's perspective was a lot stranger and more difficult that I would have imagined, and I kinda realize why Son doesn't do it. Rai doesn't really have an inner monologue! I'm guessing he doesn't think of himself as elegant or serene or poised or any other word people tend to describe him by because for him it's not a description it's just what he is/does. He also doesn't really think too deeply about his actions or the actions of others because he just does whatever he wants/that would be rude.

The next chapter (or two) will be drawing the parallels between the Bleach Universe and the Noblesse Universe :)

Please review! :)


	11. Chapter 11

She hadn't been expecting them to give her a room, especially not one that was this nicely furnished. The room's décor was mostly white and midnight blue, with accents of pale yellow in the rug and curtains. There was a large bathroom attached and a closet that already had some simple white shirts and grey shorts stocked, and the bed was neatly made. There didn't seem to be a speck of dust anywhere. It was by far the nicest place she had ever slept in, though to be fair there wasn't a whole lot of competition.

Had they given her someone _else's_ room?

Well, the friendly young man with a bowl cut had insisted she rest here, so it must be fine.

Since she had the opportunity, her first order of business was to take a shower. Even though she hadn't really fought anyone and gotten blood on her or anything, she still felt she needed a shower after the past 24 hours she'd been through. She went through the process of removing her equipment and uniform while still keeping the seal in place, so that all she was left in was a choker of black metal with her sealed zanpakutou hanging from it. She found some shampoo and soap in a cabinet and stepped in. Showering was a relaxing chore, something she could do on autopilot, which was good, as she was still doing her best to keep herself from letting her mind stray.

Afterwards she dried herself and her hairsted.e a gigai to get answers to tumbled around in my . favorite band.

e in a house full of unknow and put her clothes back on.

It would be more prudent to stay in her soul form while in a house full of unknown people, so she didn't make a gigai to get into. Not to mention she was exhausted. This day had felt like it had lasted an eternity, and all she wanted to do was go to sleep for a few hours. She pulled back the sheets and curled up. The bed quickly warmed up as she snuggled under the covers. The mattress was extremely comfortable, but as tired as her body was, she just could not turn off her brain. She curled up even more and thought about the people of the household. Anything to distract herself. What were they, who were they, how many of them there were, why they were in South Korea.

Oh, and how laid-back they apparently were. Her eyebrows contracted as this thought popped into her mind.

They hadn't even posted a guard outside her door. Come on guys, just because she had helped them didn't mean she was trustworthy. Hell, they were already in some sort of feud, what if she was trying to infiltrate them or something?

Unless they had cameras in the room. It was a mark of how tired she was that this thought didn't immediately set her on edge.

Well, it didn't really matter, because she didn't mean them any harm.

But _they_ didn't know that.

Unless they did.

But how could they?

Questions and thoughts that she didn't have answers to tumbled around in her brain. And sometime during her pointless ponderings about the strange people who lived here, she fell asleep.

Judging from the position of the sun it had only been a few hours since she had fallen asleep, but that was fine. She really only needed a few hours of sleep anyway, and she usually slept for less than that. Her sleep had been restless and broken, but she _had_ gotten some, so it would have to do.

She laid there staring at the ceiling for what felt like another hour, knowing she would never be able to fall back asleep, yet still not wanting to get up. The left side of her brain noticed how unusual this pattern was for her. She was usually so motivated and curious. Now she was lying in a bed, in a room, in a _country_ she had never been before, with over a dozen unknown beings who she had never encountered before, and all she could do was stare at the ceiling.

 _You're being pathetic._

She was mourning. She needed to mourn, find closure. That's what people do in this situation.

 _You're not mourning, you're wallowing in self-pity. Get your ass up, Arien, you're stronger than this. Aren't you?_

She closed her eyes against Nike's twisted way of comforting her and tried to absorb some of Nike's callousness. Nike was right. This wasn't her.

She would have to find a way to get over this, to move on. It would not be easy. In fact, she didn't even know where to start.

Well. She could start with getting outta bed.

She sat up and slung her legs over the side of the bed. Or at least she tried to, if her feet hadn't gotten caught on the absurdly puffy comforter. She had never understood the dangers of Western-style beds before now; after all, you couldn't fall out of a futon! It was ridiculous how she could fight flawlessly on any terrain against numerous opponents and yet still manage to fall out of bed.

She picked myself off the ground with as much grace as she could muster, suddenly glad that no one had been standing guard outside and had rushed in to see her lying in a heap beside the bed. If they had cameras in this room she would have to delete that footage before anyone saw it even if it cost her her life. After making that vow and feeling her cheeks return to a normal temperature, she stretched as she walked to the door. However, as she reached for the doorknob she paused, rethinking her options.

… Should she just go? She had helped these people out pretty well, enough to repay them for saving her. Plus, now they had seen her abilities. Her abilities were coveted; she knew that very well. She also knew how dangerous they were and how devastating they could be in the wrong hands. She had confidence in her combat skills. But still, 13 vs. 1 was not something she would want to enter into if she could avoid it, especially in the middle of a crowded city.

Though if she left now she would never find out who they were or what they were doing here. She knew some of them were werewolves (after seeing M-21 transform all doubts had left her mind about what _he_ was, at least), but she still didn't know _who_ they were.

She mulled it over as she stood in front of the door. Perhaps some kind of exchange? Some information about her for information about them. Unless they already had information on her? Or at least information on Shinigami and Hollows. But she wasn't your typical Shinigami or Hollow. They'd probably be curious as to her enhanced powers. But was it worth it?

The old me would have stayed and found out, she thought. The _real_ me.

She scowled at that thought as if it had been a challenge.

Fine, she'd stay and investigate.

It wasn't like she had anyone waiting at home for her.

So she opened the door and started walking down the hall towards the living room. It seemed they were having a family gathering or something (dinner, maybe? Breakfast? What time was it?) because she could tell everyone was together there. She hadn't been paying much attention earlier when she had briefly seen the others, so she couldn't put a face to every energy she felt, but she could pick out a few of them.

Muzaka, who was all easy confidence and relaxed restraint. M-21, whose human soul mixed almost seamlessly with that of his werewolf energy. And Raizel. She was strangely pleased to notice that Raizel's soul had rebounded wonderfully. She had spent about an hour pouring all the energy she could into him, and it seems his strong will and soul had made the best of it. It didn't even seem necessary to perform the more direct technique she had been planning to use. That was good. That would require her to release her seal again, and she could normally only release her seal once every three days. Combine that with the fact that she may be leaving in a hurry and on bad terms, it was better that she didn't have to worry about him.

Regardless of how this relationship would end, she had always gotten a sense of satisfaction and happiness from healing others, so it pleased her that he would live.

She walked down the stairs to reach the first floor. She had been so exhausted after healing Raizel that she didn't actually remember going this way, but this was the direction the energy was coming from so she just followed it. She walked silently down a long, immaculate, tasteful hallway toward the end of the hall. All the doors she passed were obviously solid wood, ash or alder, perhaps. The doorknobs were simple, but elegant, and appeared to be brass that had aged gracefully. What did the owner do for a living, to own such a well-designed and large mansion? Was he a CEO of a company? Did he win the lottery? Was he a drug lord?

For that matter, which one of them was the owner? Most of them looked like adults, so it could theoretically be any of them. Or all of them, if they were like a commune where each individual pitched in fiscally. She added job descriptions to her seemingly endless list of things she wanted to ask these people.

As she reached the end of the hallway she could hear the boisterous guy with a Hollow talking. She paused right outside the doorway as she heard her name. Something about a soul weapon? And how she used it to heal Raizel? Hmm, 'soul weapon' sounded vaguely familiar, but probably just because it sounded similar to 'soul-cutter sword.' Still, if they didn't know what technique she used then they almost certainly didn't know about the 4th Division. She filed that away as another piece of information she could trade.

The clink of dishes being moved, the rustling of bags and packages, and the steady thud of a knife against a cutting board punctuated the next sentences (spoken by Blondie she was pretty sure), so she wasn't able to catch all of it. She got the gist of it though. While Blondie seemed to be aware of how non-humans constantly absorb energy to maintain their elevated powers, he still was not sure as to what type of non-human she was. Which means he didn't know what a Quincy was.

She smiled to myself slightly. It was glaringly obvious that these guys didn't have clue as to what she was, and them debating wouldn't get them any closer to the answer. The trade would probably work out well then.

She stepped out from the hallway and cleared her throat since no one was looking in her direction.

"Well, at least I'm not the only one confused about what's going on."

That got everyone's attention, every face turning toward her with expressions that held various stages of surprise, from shock to mildly interested.

Muzaka was the first to recover, smiling largely and beckoning her over. Did nothing ever phase this man?

"Hey, Arien, you're awake! Here, I saved you a seat," gesturing to the empty space beside him.

She gave him an amused and slightly exasperated smile as she sat down and crossed her legs, using this opportunity to more thoroughly examine the other people from the household.

The two silver-hair children were sitting across from her. While the girl was completely expressionless as she sipped her tea, the boy was staring at her with a look of wonder mixed with a healthy amount of confusion and a dash of awe.

She then noticed their irises were red.

It wasn't obvious; in fact, it almost seemed like they were making a special effort to hide it. Which certainly made sense; red irises would definitely stand out in the Human World. That must be why she didn't notice it before when she saw them briefly earlier – it was like her consciousness was gazing at it without truly registering what it was seeing. That was interesting. Another question added to the list.

The young man sitting next to them was one of the three with a Hollow. He was tall with blue eyes, and he had very long, unbound, purple-ish hair that probably reached his ankle. He also wore an eyepatch on his right eye.

The boy sitting close to her had short, wavy, blonde hair and a slightly petulant look on his face like he really didn't want her here but didn't want to be rude. He had red eyes as well, she noted.

As did the other blonde man behind him. He was taller than the boy with short blond hair, and his hair was longer. Perhaps a relative? He was standing almost directly behind the other blonde boy in what she imagined to be a protective manner, though his posture didn't indicate that he was expecting an attack.

M-21 she of course knew to a certain extent, though he too was standing protectively behind the young silver-haired boy and the man with an eyepatch. The perpetually cheerful one was standing beside him, grinning sheepishly at her. Probably because she had overheard them talking about her, and he knew it.

Blondie stood in the kitchen area preparing ingredients. For ramen, she quickly realized. What was these people's deal with ramen? He was smiling charmingly, though she could tell he had not appreciated being eavesdropped on. His smile emphasized his canines a little too much.

Lunark stood almost directly behind her, along with a very buff man with a mohawk and a woman with reddish-orange hair in a ponytail. Normally she didn't let herself sit with her back to people she don't know, especially when they were so close, but she didn't want to show weakness in front of them. Weaknesses could be exploited, after all.

Muzaka and Raizel, again, were people she was somewhat familiar with.

It had only taken a few moments to quickly assess the people in the room while she had straightened her uniform and run a hand through her hair, completely at ease. She still felt confident in her ability to escape if need be, so that analysis would have to do until she could get more information. Overall, these people didn't seem aggressive towards her, and she didn't want to make it seem like she was being overly curious. That would be suspicious.

Blondie broke the silence. "Miss Arien, I am very pleased to see you are awake. How are you feeling?"

Was he fishing for injuries, weaknesses? Or was he being sincere? His expression had softened slightly into a genuine smile, so she decided to go with the latter. It wasn't like she was injured either way, so she wouldn't be lying. Besides, she couldn't take him seriously when he was wearing a pink apron.

"I'm feeling fine, Mr. …?" She trailed off suggestively, hoping he would introduce himself so she could stop thinking of him as 'Blondie.'

He blinked and tilted his head before catching her drift.

"Ah, that's right, I hadn't realized, you haven't been introduced to us all."

He set down the knife he had been using to expertly peel and chop vegetables before walking a little further into the living room.

"Well, I know you've already met Muzaka, Lunark, and M-21," he said, gesturing to each person respectively as he spoke. "Beside Muzaka is Ma - Cadis Etrama di Raizel-nim, who you have also met, though I do not think we told you his name."

"But you can just call him Raizel," Muzaka cut in amiably.

Arien nodded and smiled at Raizel, glad Muzaka had spoken. Cadis Etrama di Raizel? She sure as hell didn't wanna say that every time. 'Raizel' was much simpler. Raizel nodded respectfully back and continued drinking his tea.

"Behind you is Miss Garda and Kentas." Garda and Kentas both nodded gravely. She nodded back, fighting hard to keep an amused smile off her face. Were these people always so serious, or was it just because they didn't know her and were being cautious?

"Across from you is Miss Seira," the silver-haired woman nodded gracefully, "Regis," the silver-haired boy crossed his arms and tried to look more dignified as he nodded as well, "Takeo," the man with the purple hair nodded and smiled, "and Rael," the smaller blonde-haired boy nodded, arms still crossed haughtily. She smiled and nodded to each of them as they were introduced.

"Behind them is Tao –"

"Hey there!" Tao grinned, waving as if he thought she couldn't see him well. "It's nice to meet you!"

Good lord, this boy, she thought. She chuckled softly. At least one of them wasn't afraid to do more than nod. "It's nice to meet you, too, Tao." Tao put his hands on his hips and smiled.

"Ahem," Blondie was staring daggers at Tao, who quickly adopted an expression of repentance for his slight interruption.

"And beside him is Karias," Blondie continued.

She had thought Tao's reaction was extreme compared to the others, but Karias was apparently on a whole other level.

Karias immediately stepped forward a few steps until he was directly in front of her. A lovely red rose appeared out of thin air as he knelt down on one knee in front of her and looked her directly in the eye.

"It is my absolute pleasure to meet you, Miss Arien. I could not find a rose as lovely as you, but I would be honored if you accepted this one nonetheless."

His expression was dead serious and completely sincere.

Takeo facepalmed.

Her bewildered expression must have been amusing, because Muzaka burst out laughing. Arien's eyebrow started to twitch at the loud noise, but she took a deep breath as she reached for the rose. She brought it up to her nose and breathed in its gentle scent. Where had he been keeping a fresh, unrumpled rose? Somewhere in his suit? Well, however he did it, it was very impressive. She smiled graciously at him.

"Thank you Karias, it's beautiful. I'm very pleased to meet a fine gentleman such as yourself." She threw an icy look at Muzaka, who covered his mouth a little and quieted his chuckles, though he didn't look apologetic in the least. Karias smiled and nodded grandly as he stood up with a flourish and returned to the space he had previously occupied.

"Well, that's everyone who lives here. As for me, you can call me Principal Lee or Chairman," Blondie – Principal Lee – said. A principal? Like, at a school for children? Well that would explain the school uniforms.

She had also noticed that she had only been given first names (with the possible exceptions of Raizel and M-21). Strangely, though, their caution towards her caused her to feel relief instead of anxiety. It was reassuring to know they had a little prudence.

She smiled at the room in general, "It's nice to meet you all."

"Likewise," The Chairman responded, presumably replying for everyone.

She paused for a brief moment. She really wasn't used to talking in front of so many strangers. But she really didn't want to sit in an awkward silence as they tried to feel each other out. Plus, they already knew she had overheard them speculating about her. Might as well use that as an icebreaker.

"So, it seems you guys have some questions for me as well." She lightly emphasized the ending. She had questions of her own, after all. This wasn't going to be a free-for-all Q&A session staring yours truly.

Muzaka snorted. "That's an understatement. We're completely in the dark when it comes to you."

Hmm. Muzaka was apparently really bad at subterfuge. He had just admitted that she held all the cards in this discussion. She sighed inwardly. Even though she knew she only wanted to know about these people to satisfy her own curiosity and not for anything nefarious, it still made her cringe when she saw and heard such carefree attitudes.

The Chairman spoke before she could respond, his tone earnest. "Indeed, as I am sure you heard, we are curious as to your identity. However, please let me say, I hope you do not feel that we are expecting you to, or going to make you, tell us. I am personally indebted to you already for saving Master and helping M-21. Thank you." Several members of the household nodded at this statement, and the boy called Regis had regained his wondering expression. "In fact, if there is anything that you would like to ask, feel free to do so. I will answer to the best of my abilities."

… These people really knew how to throw her for a loop.

That was it? She hadn't expected them to grill her for info, of course, but only because of their relatively easy-going demeanor. But they weren't even going to suggest an information exchange? That was what she had been expecting, had banked on. It was clear they were absolutely baffled over who and what she was, but just because she had healed a few of them, they were giving her the option to be the one to ask all the questions? They had even gone as far as to say they were indebted to her.

And the weirdest thing about all of this was that he sounded 100% genuine.

She just didn't know what to think about these people.

Something didn't sit right with her about that offer, though. Though she apparently had the choice of not revealing anything about herself, it just didn't seem … fair. These people were so sincere. She knew she would feel guilty about not sating their curiosity while sating hers. She knew what it was like to be overwhelmingly curious, too.

Damn, these people's naivety must be rubbing off on her, but she didn't seem to care as much as she thought she would. Maybe some spontaneity would be good for her right now.

"It's okay," she assured the Chairman and the room at large, "It's true that I have some questions for you, but I don't mind answering your questions as well. It's not like it's a big secret," she said, shrugging her shoulders. The spiritual world was usually kept pretty secret, it was true, but only from normal humans. There was no real reason to keep it from these guys.

The Chairman looked at her for a moment before nodding. "Very well, if you're sure. Well, then how about we go first. What would you like to know?"

She smiled softly. "Well, I suppose I will ask the most general question first. What are you guys?"

Principal Lee smiled back. "Well, Muzaka, M-21, Kentas, Miss Garda, and Miss Lunark are all werewolves." Called it. But wait, something didn't add up. He paused. He must have seen my confusion.

She turned toward M-21. "I hadn't thought you were a full werewolf."

M-21 looked surprised for a brief second. "I'm not," he replied a little sharply. He took a deep breath. "I was originally human, but I was … turned into a werewolf."

She nodded, not really knowing what to say to that.

"How did you know he wasn't a full werewolf?" She glanced behind her at Kentas. She assumed everyone already knew that M-21 was human and werewolf mixed, but perhaps they were just testing her. No matter. She had already agreed to answer questions.

"Because, though his werewolf energy dominated his soul while he was transformed, his human soul is still perfectly discernible, especially when he's not transformed like right now."

Kentas scowled slightly but nodded. Probably a test, then.

"I included M-21 with the other werewolves because you had seen him transform," Principal Lee elaborated. "As I said before, I, of course, will tell you anything I can, but I did not know how M-21 would feel about me revealing his past, and did not feel it was my right to assume he would be comfortable with it." He seemed adamant that she not assume he was trying to deliberately deceive her.

Not that it had really bothered her or anything, she had just been confused.

"It's fine," she said. "It's not my intention to pry or be rude, so if I ask something that upsets any of you feel free to tell me so. I will not take offense." She had already inferred that M-21, at least, had been experimented on, and she knew how sensitive that subject could be.

Principal Lee smiled graciously at her. "Thank you for understanding. To continue, in addition to M-21, myself, Takeo, and Tao are all humans who have been enhanced one way or another, generally for the purpose of improving combat abilities."

"You three are humans?" Not souls in gigais? Not Fullbringers?

"Yep!" Tao said, nodding enthusiastically.

That was strange. How could living humans have such powerful Hollow energy radiating from them? Unless they were just concealing their true identities. But the Chairman was still talking, so she would have to ask later.

"Everyone else here," Principal Lee was saying, "are Nobles."

Nobles, huh? Wait. Like, Nobles with a capital N?! Of course!

She brought her hand up to her head and smacked her forehead. "That makes so much sense!" she exclaimed. How come she didn't realize that sooner? It was so obvious! True, she had never technically met a Noble before, but they were the only other being she knew about.

Muzaka looked at her. "What? So you know about Nobles but you don't know about werewolves?" His tone suggested that he was hurt, but the small smirk gave away his amusement.

Hmph. "What makes you think I don't know about werewolves?"

He frowned a little.

It was her turn to smirk at him now.

"Ah, so you know about Nobles, Miss Arien?" She turned away from Muzaka to face Principal Lee.

"Only some general information," she shrugged. "I know the names of a few of the clans, as well as some of their general abilities and social structure, but that's all."

"Oh, really?" Karias said, clearly interested. "What clans are you familiar with?"

"The Labrys, Kertia, and Loyard clans."

"What?" The boy named Rael spoke for the first time. "How do you know about mine and Seira's clan?" He sounded upset. What did it matter if she did? Still, she hadn't really expected any of them to be from the clans she was most familiar with. That was kinda nice. At least it might make explaining her own side a little easier.

"Oh, what clan are you two a part of?"

"I am the Kertia Clan Leader and Seira is the Loyard Clan Leader. And if someone has been leaking information about our clans I demand you tell us so that we may silence him."

Oh, so he had been afraid of a security breach.

Wait, they were the clan leaders? And Seira was the _Loyard_ clan leader? She had not expected that. They both looked so _young_. But of course they were immortal, so maybe not so young. Still, this was so exciting! She had never thought she would meet the leader of not only the Kertia clan, but also the Loyard clan!

Well, first she should assuage the boy's worries.

"No, no one has been leaking information about either of your clans. The information I have is over 2000 years old anyway. I am simply familiar with them because the entire foundation of the Gotei 13 is based on the information given to Genryusai Yamamoto by Ravi J. Loyard.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** Goodness this was a long chapter for me. And I didn't really get any real explaining done! Don't worry, next chapter for sure!

So, everyone's speaking in Korean of course, but I didn't quite know how to indicate that Arien didn't know Franky's name, so I just left it as the English 'Mr…?'

If you can tell me what manga I pulled that rose line that Karias uses I'll give you a cookie :)

Finally, I had to make up a couple of Noble names. Ravi (pronounced with a long a sound) J. Loyard is the name for one of Seira's predecessors and the 'Labrys' clan is Gradeus's clan. Labrys is a greek word for a double-headed axe, plus it sounded Noble-y, so I figured it would do.

Please review and all! :)


	12. Chapter 12

The room was silent.

Then several people spoke at once.

"What's Gotei 13 mean?"

"Gen-who?"

"Wait, you're over 2000 years old?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Who is that?"

Huh. Only a few sentences into her so-called 'information exchange' and everyone's already confused. Nice going, Arien. It's a good thing I'm not a teacher, she thought. Then she sighed. Probably should have taken this step-by-step. Well, too late now.

She ran a hand through her hair again. "Well, that's a little hard to explain." Where was she supposed to start?

"How about I start by asking y'all what you know about souls in general?" That way she could build on whatever foundation they already had.

Except the room was silent again.

"Souls? What do you want to know about souls?" The Kertia clan leader snapped. She scowled a little at him. For a clan leader he sure was awfully touchy. What was his problem? Still, he was probably just a child. She took a deep breath to calm herself. She knew she had a bit of a temper, but it wouldn't do to lash out at children.

" _I_ don't want to know anything about souls. I'm asking you what _you_ know about souls. I can't explain anything about myself without understanding how much you know yourselves and building upon that. If it helps, I will narrow it down to human souls. What do you know about human souls? I'm assuming you at least know about Hollows, but any other information would be appreciated so I don't waste time explaining subjects you already know about."

Rael scowled, his expression confused, but said nothing.

Arien glanced around the room and saw nothing but confused faces. Was this question really that hard? Even if they _only_ knew about Hollows, they could just tell her that. Why the confusion?

"Um, question!" Tao's hand was half-raised as he looked around the room until his gaze settled on her.

"What are 'Hollows'?" His eyes jumped from the Chairman to her. He was met by a confused face and a blank one.

"… You're joking, right?" He had to be joking. Either that or he was trying to hide that they knew about Hollows. But why do that, when it was obvious sje knew about Hollows, too? Perhaps they thought they were the only people who had figured out Hollowfication? But that still didn't mean they were the only ones to know about _Hollows_.

Tao shook his head.

"Uh, no, I'm not." Tao replied, sounding slightly apologetic and mostly confused. He glanced around the room again. "Guys, do you know what it is, am I the only one in the dark here?" His eyes landed on the Chairman once more, who shook his head, as did everyone else in the room.

"Never heard of them. Or it. Whatever they are," Muzaka replied unconcernedly.

The Chairman brought a hand up to his chin. "Though I of course know the definition of 'hollow,' from the context I can assume you are referring to a proper name, not just a noun. I do not know of anything or anyone who refers to themselves as 'Hollows.'"

Miss Seira set her tea down and spoke for the first time.

"Why did you assume that we had this knowledge?"

That got attention, some expressions changing from confused to pensive.

Still, Arien just looked at her incredulously. Then she looked around the room, half-expecting someone to shout, "April Fools!" When no one did, she closed her eyes and put her head down, holding up an index finger as she did so they knew to give her a minute while she gathered her thoughts.

Okay, so no one knew what Hollows were. No wait, some of them _knew_ , they had just never heard them called that, apparently. How? She didn't know, but that was the case it seemed. Normally she would have assumed they were lying, trying to get information out of her. But these guys? They hadn't done anything underhanded or untrustworthy as of yet. Unless they were actually master manipulators and excellent actors, using cluelessness and kind words to get the information they wanted.

But she just couldn't bring myself to believe that of them, if only because they had pretty much answered her questions without a trace of guile.

Who and what were they? Nobles, werewolves, and humans. It was interesting to know that there were werewolves in the Human World, but since Soul Society had its own … version? species? sect?… of werewolves it wasn't all that strange that the Human World had some, too.

Why were some of their irises red? Nobles had red irises, she knew that from her memories. Well, Old Man Yamamoto's memories, but they were her memories, too, in a way. She hadn't put two and two together just because it was a memory she never thought about. Also from what she knew it was strange for so many Nobles to be so far from Lukedonia. Not that she knew where Lukedonia was, but she sure as hell knew it wasn't in South Korea.

Who owned this super nice house? Well, she assumed it was the Chairman since most of the people in the house seemed to refer to him. But he called Raizel 'Master' so maybe it was Raizel's. Regardless, even if she was wrong about that she could now understand how they could afford such a nice house: most of them were immortal! It's easy to be rich when one's immortal.

She still didn't know who or what they were fighting, though.

Well, since the ball was in her court right now she could explain her side and then ask them about what is happening with their side.

Easier said than done, though. How in the world was she going to explain about the entirety of the spiritual world to them efficiently _and_ thoroughly? These people were apparently starting from scratch. That was a lot of material to describe and explain. How was she going to teach it to them in the simplest and easiest way possible, especially when she had already gotten the vibe that she was not the World's Best Teacher?

Wait. Teacher. Principal Lee. _Principal_ Lee. That might work. She had never stayed among humans while she was in the Human World, but she did have a lot of theoretical knowledge about it.

"Okay," she said to the room at large, finally raising her head. "I am going to have to explain a fair amount of … back story… before I can tell you anything about myself. Otherwise it won't make any sense. But since it is a lot of information it will be much easier to explain and comprehend if I have some sort of visual representation."

She turned toward Principal Lee.

"Principal Lee, you are in charge of a school, yes?"

His eyes lit up in comprehension almost immediately. He nodded his head.

"I see. You wish to use chalk boards in order to more effectively teach us."

She nodded her head. This guy was pretty quick on the uptake. "Yes," she agreed. "Unless you have a chalk board here." She made the statement sound almost like a question as she looked at Principal Lee with an eyebrow raised. After all, it wouldn't surprise her if he did have one, what with how enormous and well-equiped this house seemed to be.

Principal Lee smiled slightly and shook his head, probably correctly interpreting her line of thought. "No, we do not have a chalk board here. We will have to go to the school for that."

Almost before he had finished his sentence, Raizel had set his tea down and stood up gracefully, walking sedately toward the door. The other Nobles in the room had risen immediately after Raizel, mostly with surprised expressions. Not that she blamed them. She was pretty surprised herself at his sudden movement. Well, sudden for him from what she could tell. Did that mean he was secretly really curious about what she was going to tell them, or was he just planning to lead the way?

She figured she should stand up as well and heard Muzaka doing the same behind her. She shifted a little as he moved to stand next to her. The four humans in the room quickly followed the Nobles, with Principal Lee moving to walk directly behind Raizel. She and the four werewolves brought up the rear, with Muzaka beside her and the other three forming a rough semi-circle behind him.

Behind _us_ , she corrected herself. Did they think she was going to run? Or were they expecting her to attack Muzaka? Or were they just being cautious as she had suspected earlier? She had found Lunark's suspicions a little irritating earlier, but now their caution was equal parts amusing and reassuring. And also a little touching as well. They must really want to ensure that no harm comes to Muzaka. That was rather sweet of them, to want to protect their leader. Presumed leader.

She smiled softly as she glanced up at Muzaka – he was over half a foot taller than her, after all – only to find that he was already looking at her, his expression curious. Her smile turned questioning as she met his eye, but before he could say anything the whole group stopped, forcing her attention toward the front of the group before she tripped over someone and they went down like dominoes. Why had everyone stopped? Was something wrong? She didn't sense any danger nearby, but maybe they knew something she didn't.

But it must have been nothing, because soon afterwards the door opened and everyone was filing out. She supposed the doorway must have caused a bottleneck, so that's why they had stopped earlier.

Everyone disappeared into the air as soon as they were outside, and she followed suit, leaping effortlessly after the leaders of the group and onto a series of rooftops. The three humans other than Principal Lee, as well as Regis and Rael, took up more defensive positions as the house disappeared from view, fanning out around and behind them. The Kertia clan leader moved a little separately from the others, still clearly working in tandem but with more freedom, almost completely hiding his aura and position while overtaking Raizel as the lead. Scouting.

If she hadn't been so trained in the minutiae of energy and detection she would have lost track of him. She smirked. So he isn't the Kertia clan leader for nothing, huh? Her respect for him rose a bit, especially if he was as young as he acted.

The other four seemed to be working together without any signals, a sign that they were used to working as a unit. M-21 had dropped behind everyone while Takeo and Tao stayed on the left and Regis to the right. She puzzled over Takeo and Tao being on the same side – why not one of them stay with Regis, a child? – until she remembered Takeo's eyepatch. Tao was there in case Takeo missed anything due his blind spot. Her respect for these guys rose as well. They were obviously well-trained with significant combat experience. How long had they been fighting for?

Questions for another time, she thought as they landed within a gated area. An elegant, five-story building stood in darkness while its grounds were lit by the rising sun. Too early for any children or staff to be here. It might not even be a school day, she thought bemusedly as she followed Raizel and the others into the school. After going up a few flights of stairs and walking down a hallway Raizel opened the door to one of the classrooms and walked in. He calmly walked past a podium and down a row of seats before sitting in the desk at the back right corner of the room and turning to stare out the window. Seira and Regis followed after him, Seira sitting in a seat three rows ahead and one to the left while Regis went to the very back and sat in the desk next to Raizel. Everyone else just stood around, including her.

She frowned at the three who had sat down. There was no need for them to sit so far back. Plus, Regis was the shortest out of everyone, if he sat back there he would not be able to see over whoever sat in front of him. She would have to take charge for a little while. She looked around, at a loss for the moment. She wasn't really used to taking charge of anything outside the battlefield. She had no idea where to start. It was a feeling she had had increasingly the past couple of hours, and one that she distinctly didn't like. But she had to do _something_.

Well, start with the ones who had sat down. Then go from there.

"Raizel, could you please move forward two rows? Regis, could you please move to the front row, right in front of Seira preferably?"

"What?" Regis asked, confused. "Why? This is where we always sit."

Oh, so that's why they had sat there.

"Perhaps, but this isn't your normal classroom. There are only thirteen of you, and this classroom seats twenty-five. If you sit in the back you won't be able to see the board. And there's no need for Raizel to sit in the back corner by himself when he can just move up a few rows and be closer."

Raizel stood up and quietly moved to the space she had told him to without any fuss, turning once again to look out the window when he had sat down. Regis blushed as if chastised and moved to sit in front of Seira.

"Thank you," she said, smiling at both of them. That hadn't been so bad.

"Hey Miss Arien, where should we sit?" Tao walked up to the podium and put his arms on it, resting his chin on his arms as he looked at her.

What? They wanted her to seat all of them? She glanced at the rest of them, who were now watching her. Well, if only those three were students here then the others might be unsure of where to sit. Might as well give them temporary assigned seats.

"Muzaka, please go sit next to Raizel. Principal Lee, could you go sit in front of Raizel?" Both Muzaka and Principal Lee seemed keen on staying near Raizel, and Muzaka was really tall, so he needed to be in the back.

"Kentas, if you could sit next to Muzaka and Lunark in front of you." It would probably make them feel better to be seated near Muzaka. "Rael, please sit next to Regis, in front of Principal Lee. Garda, if you could sit in front of Lunark and Karias, please sit next to her. Takeo, if you could sit behind Garda, please. Tao, please sit beside Karias, and M-21 behind Tao." As she called each person's name they moved to where she had indicated and settled down.

There. She looked around, pleased. Now the first two and a half rows were filled and everyone should be able to see over whoever they were sitting behind.

And they were all staring at her.

Oh right. She was supposed to be teaching them.

She ran her hand through her hair yet again as she stepped up to the podium. She was pretty sure that's where the teacher was supposed to stand. She frowned a little as she thought about where to start.

She sighed. Just dive in, she thought. As long as you can at least tread water you'll be fine.

"Okay guys, so I'm just going to start with the very basics and work my way up. Some of it you may already know, but I'm going to explain it anyway in case someone else doesn't. This may seem… unbelievable to you, but I assure you that everything I am about to tell you is true, so please don't write it off as ridiculous and tell me that it's impossible. You don't have to believe me, I'm just telling you what I know. I'd like to think that as beings with extraordinary powers yourselves, you will be willing to accept what I am saying."

She had never explained the concept surrounding the spiritual world to anyone, but it would probably sound pretty unbelievable. As in it would be very hard to believe.

"Also, as I said before, please leave any questions you have about me in particular until after I am done. I do intend to tell you about myself, but not until I've explained enough of the basics. I will do my best to answer any question you have along the way about the general information, but if your question requires further explanation than I will have to explain further before being able to answer it."

Everyone was nodding.

Tao raised his hand.

She stared at him for a moment. "Yes, Tao?"

"Can I go get my laptop and take notes? It won't take but a second."

Not what she was expecting, but that was an interesting question. She didn't mind explaining to these people about herself, but having written notes about it? Well, since she was trusting them this much she might as well see how far that trust could stretch. Plus, it wouldn't be true data on her. Anyone could write whatever they wanted, it didn't make it viable. But all the same. Best to be on the safe side if possible.

"I don't mind if you take notes about the general knowledge that I'm about to give you," she said slowly, "but I would prefer not to have documentation, written or recorded, about the information I give you regarding myself." You could use a laptop to record audio, she was sure.

Tao just nodded seriously at this. "Okay, that makes sense. Thanks seonsaeng, I'll be right back!"

He rushed out the room in a blur. Well, that had worked easier than she thought it would. Of course, she would have to see the notes afterwards to know if he had kept his word, but at least he hadn't argued or tried to weasel her into giving him more leeway.

But before that…

"Did he just call me seonsaeng?" she asked blankly to no one in particular. She knew that that was the Korean word for 'teacher,' but it still felt weird to have someone call her that.

"Tao seems to enjoy being a student," Takeo said, sounding amused.

M-21 scoffed. "I'm surprised he didn't ask if he could go make himself and everyone else a Ye Ran uniform."

Takeo was chuckling when Tao returned, laptop under his arm.

"What are you laughing at?" Tao pouted, quickly setting his laptop up on his desk.

"You," M-21 responded without mercy.

"What did I do?" Tao sounded outraged, but it didn't seem quite genuine to her, like he was just arguing for arguments sake.

"You were being an idiot," M-21 said, a small smirk on his face. He seemed to be celebrating the renewed use of his tongue by being snarky.

"What? When! When was I an idiot?" Tao exclaimed.

Hmm, this seemed like it could go on for a while. As funny as it was to watch them snark at each other, it was time to intervene. And if Tao liked being a student so much…

"Boys, boys, class is starting. Could you please settle down?" she said, smiling in a way that made it clear that she wasn't really asking, she was telling.

M-21 just smirked and kept his mouth closed while Tao responded with a quick, "Sorry, seonsaeng!"

She smirked a little. Playing teacher was kinda fun. "Thank you."

She turned to the chalk board, grabbing a piece of chalk as she reached up to the top of the board and wrote 'Spiritual World.'

Underneath it she wrote 'Souls.'

She turned toward the room, hearing Tao already tapping away on his keyboard.

"To start, you should know that every sentient creature has a soul. This includes dogs, cats, horses, elephants, and yes, humans. You can call them souls, ghosts, spirits, it doesn't matter, they are all the same. The soul is what's left behind when a sentient being dies. It is a general impression of their will, heart, and appearance and cannot be seen by normal humans."

No hands up yet. Good, moving on.

"Let's focus on humans souls."

She turned back to the board and drew a short line directly down from the word 'Souls.' At the end she wrote 'Plus.'

"In general, all souls you see in the Human World start out as Pluses." She pointed to the word for emphasis. "Pluses are what normal people tend to think of as 'ghosts.' They're humans that have died, but linger on due to some attachment. The reason or cause for the attachment is irrelevant: whatever it is allows them to remain in the Human World. They usually just wander around in plain sight, and are therefore easy to spot and be sent on."

She paused at that for a moment but quickly pressed on. She wasn't quite ready to explain Soul Society or Shinigami to them yet.

"Pluses are benign, but it's possible for a Plus to devolve. Attached to the chest of every normal human soul is something called the Chain of Fate. It symbolizes one's connection to life. Therefore, if the Chain is severed, the soul can no longer return to the body and is now a Plus, the soul of a deceased human. The longer a Plus stays in the Human World without being able to move on, the higher the likelihood they will devolve," she drew a long line at a forty-five degree from the word 'Plus' and wrote 'Hollow,' "into a Hollow."

She turned around to find several hands up.

She pointed at M-21.

"You say every human has this Chain of Fate, regardless of whether they're living or dead?"

She nodded. More or less.

"But you make it sound like a soul can… separate from the body without this Chain being broken. Or can a soul only leave its body when its Chain has been broken?"

Good question. "A human soul can leave its body without the Chain of Fate being broken. The Chain of Fate links the soul to the body. As long as it's not broken, the soul can return to the body. Now this doesn't really happen naturally. It usually requires special equipment or circumstances that living humans are extremely unlikely to face, but yes, it can happen."

She pointed at Principal Lee next.

"What do you mean, 'move on'?"

There it was. She knew someone would ask.

"Yeah, and what do you mean by 'Human World'?" Muzaka this time.

She smiled politely. At the Chairman. "I will explain both of your questions in a minute. And please raise your hand if you have a question, Muzaka." She glared at him until he nodded his head, smirking unapologetically. He was just doing this to make her mad, she could tell.

Principal Lee gestured for her to continue, and she looked back at the room in general.

"So, for a Plus to become a Hollow, something called corrosion must happen. Corrosion is a process where the Chain of Fate attached to a soul becomes shorter, slowly getting closer and closer to the person's heart. Now, when I say heart, I do not mean it literally. I am referring to whatever was closest to their heart. It could have been a family member or a lover, a material item, a grudge, a promise, or even the circumstances of their death. It tends to be whatever is keeping them from passing on. As the corrosion occurs, whatever occupies their hearts grows and begins to take over their thoughts, their actions, their whole being. If it's a person, the Plus will become an Obsessed Spirit and is bound to that person by their Chain of Fate. If it's a place, the Plus becomes an Earthbound Spirit and is similarly bound."

"These souls are capable of hiding their presence and are very hard to detect, which is unfortunate, as they are the ones that will later become Hollows."

She looked thoughtfully at Tao and Takeo before my gaze settled on Principal Lee. "You said you did not know what a Hollow was?"

Principal Lee looked hard at her. "No, I don't."

She turned back toward the board and stared at it for a long moment, lost in thought.

"Hollows are the fallen souls of humans. They do not feel as they once did. They barely think. They are constantly filled with pain and anger, pain and anger whose source is whatever took over their heart. In order to ease their own pain, they devour the souls of others, even the souls of those they loved in the past. They become like rabid animals, mindlessly driven."

She took a deep breath. "To possess a Hollow is unnatural. Possible, but unnatural. It is a Hollow's very nature to consume, and it will do whatever it can to destroy anyone who does not have the strength to resist it by attacking them physically and mentally. Even if that person is its host."

Tao stopped typing. She turned back around to find shocked expressions staring at her, but her eyes sought out Principal Lee's.

His face showed nothing but recognition.

"You know exactly what a Hollow is, Principal Lee."

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** Think about it. Dark Spear is a freaking Hollow, it's just more unstable than a White because it was created using a different method. Frankenstein is the original Visored!

And yes, they were waiting for Rai to open the door, that's why they all stopped lol.


	13. Chapter 13

Principal Lee stared at her thoughtfully as the rest of the room was silent, glancing between the two of them.

The Chairman did not look doubtful as he asked her, "So you're saying the Dark Spear is one these Hollows?"

….

What?

"Dark Spear?" Arien asked, her voice shaking ever so slightly.

"Yes, that's what I call him."

Arien stared at him.

And stared at him.

Raizel glanced at her.

"Huh," she said, "You're Frankenstein, aren't you?" If her voice sounded odd, no one pointed it out.

He raised an eyebrow, clearly not expecting that. "Why yes, I am."

Vaguely she heard a few noises of surprise from around the room, but she stared at him for a few more moments. So this man was Frankenstein. SHe wondered how she should feel about that. If she should feel anything. Right now she couldn't really seem to think clearly, so she said the first thing that came to mind.

"I never expected you to be a blonde."

He clearly had not been expecting that either. His eyebrows rose again while the corners of his mouth inched up, and before she knew it he was laughing, his head thrown slightly back. She half-smiled herself, bemused, as the rest of the room looked at him with varying emotions, obviously just as confused about this reaction as she was. As his laughter tapered off, he glanced at the rest of the room and chuckled.

"I apologize. That's not the reaction I usually get when people first hear my name. It was quite refreshing. But I did not mean to disrupt class. Please continue Miss Arien." He said graciously, subtly providing a segway for her to continue the lesson.

She smiled at him. She could think about this later. Focus on the lesson.

Arien drew another forty-five degree line from 'Plus' and wrote 'Shinigami' at the end. Gathering her scattered thoughts, she continued.

"Now, before I explain what a Shinigami is, I should answer Muzaka's and Principal Lee's ( _Frankenstein's,_ he was _Frankenstein_ ) earlier questions. First, you should know that this dimension, known in the spiritual world as the Human World or the World of the Living, is one of several known dimensions. The other dimensions are Hueco Mundo, Soul Society, Royal Society, and the Underworld."

Half a dozen hands rose into the air.

Arien scowled slightly. She knew this would happen. So much for her grand speech she had given at the start of this about being open-minded. Though granted, it was a bit hard to accept if you were not familiar with the spiritual world and had never really seen any real proof that it existed until now. Arien had some theories as to why that was, but for now it would probably behoove all of them to convince everyone that her teachings were true, and she could only think of one irrefutable way to do that. After all, 'Seeing is Believing' was a common saying here in the Human World.

"Okay, does anyone have a question that _doesn't_ involve doubting what I just said?"

Everyone's hands slowly sank back down, though their expressions of disbelief were still quite visible.

She scratched the back of her head. Here goes. "This is probably the hardest part to absorb out of all of this, and I understand that. Therefore, I am going to open a way to one of the dimensions in the hope that it will clear your doubts."

"What?" Tao shouted. "You're going to go to another dimension?!"

She shook her head. "I am not going to another dimension. It is not that simple. All dimensions, with the possible exception of Royal Society, have a Door and a Pathway that leads to the actual dimension. You must be able to both open the Door and traverse the Pathway in order to arrive in any of the dimensions. What I am going to do is open a Door to one of the dimensions."

Garda's hand rose. Arien nodded at her, and she asked, "What dimension's Door will you be opening?"

Arien smiled slightly at her. A reasonable question that wasn't laced with doubt. Promising.

"I am going to open a Garganta, the Door that leads to Hueco Mundo. Hueco Mundo literally means 'Hollow World' in Spanish. Guess who lives there?" She paused. No one smiled. She sighed and continued. "Garganta means 'throat' and it refers to both the Door and the Pathway used to travel to and from Hueco Mundo."

She drew upon her Hollow powers, turning as she did and placing her index finger in the air behind her. She sent her Hollow powers coursing through the air around her finger for a brief instant, manipulating that space and forcing it open, the familiar sound of a Descorrer following immediately.

Along with the gasps and cries and exclamations of the people around her.

She left it open for a few more seconds, the black nothingness of unrestrained energy swirling behind her inside the edges of space she had opened, before using her energy to push the two sides back together, closing the Garganta. Nothing was left to show that it had ever been there besides the faintest traces of her spiritual energy and the shocked expressions of the people in the room.

"Huh." Muzaka said. He really was eloquent, wasn't he?

Rael recovered next, his voice sounding a little faint. "So – so that was the entrance to another dimension? Really?"

"Really," she said.

Seira raised her dainty hand. "Can we go into it?" she asked curiously. Was Miss Seira a bit of a daredevil? Arien had not expected that. Seira apparently wasn't the only one, though.

"Yeah!" Tao shouted, looking way too excited. Uh oh. "Can we go see this other dimension? Have you been there? What's it like? What about the other dimen –?"

"Tao!" He stopped talking, startled by her sudden outburst. Good. "First off, do not talk about the other dimensions as if they are fun vacation spots. That may have looked flashy and interesting to you, but the fact is going to any dimension is dangerous. As in, you could very easily die on the Pathway, before you even get to the actual dimension. All of the dimensions' Pathways are rigged in order to keep intruders out. They are. Very. Dangerous." She enunciated very clearly, hoping to get her point across in case he found a way to open it himself later on. He did have a Hollow after all. And if she was their only point of contact with the spiritual world than it was her job to warn them of its dangers. "To say nothing of the actual dimensions themselves." Arien added. "You have very real experiences with a Hollow. Have they been pleasant?" He shook his head vigorously. "Then imagine a whole _world_ of them. Sound fun?" He paled a little before shaking his head again.

She nodded, glad he had realized the seriousness of this topic.

"Now, does anyone have any more doubts about there being other dimensions?"

Lots of head shaking.

"Good, I'm going to continue then." She wasn't sure exactly how well she was doing with this whole teaching thing, but if she wanted to be done in the next millennia she was going to have to try and step up the pace.

She wrote 'Hueco Mundo' under the word 'Hollow.'

She then pointed at the word 'Shinigami' Arien had written earlier.

"Okay, so if a Plus does not linger in the Human World and moves on, they go to a dimension called Soul Society." Arien wrote 'Soul Society' under 'Shinigami.' "This is where the vast majority of souls end up. Now, all human souls, living or deceased, have something called spiritual energy. The amount of spiritual energy one sees in living humans and normal Pluses is considered average, and it is not very much. However, a small percentage of the souls who have passed on to Soul Society have an above-average amount of spiritual energy. These souls have the potential to become Shinigami."

"So here's where it gets fun. A Shinigami's job is to protect the souls of humans by exorcising Hollows. There are several ways to do this. One is to use Kidou, or Demon Arts. These are advanced spells that channel one's spiritual energy in different ways based on the incantation and Kidou used. They can be used for both direct attacks and support in battle."

Arien wrote 'Kidou' under Soul Society.'

"The second main way to kill Hollows is using a zanpakutou. Zanpakutous resemble Japanese katanas in their sealed states, and there are several levels. All zanpakutous start out as Asauchi. Asauchi tend to be the physically weakest zanpakutou while also holding the greatest potential. A Shinigami eats, sleeps, trains, and fights with their Asauchi. Eventually, if a person has a strong will and spiritual energy, then the Asauchi will tell them their name."

"Every zanpakutou's name is unique. And once you know your zanpakutou's name you are able to grow closer to it and communicate with it. If this happens then you can reach Shikai, or First Release. A Shikai reveals your zanpakutou's primary ability and form, so when you release your Shikai, chances are your zanpakutou no longer resembles a katana. Its form and abilities are unique to the wielder's personality and strengths, and typically the stronger your spiritual energy the stronger your Shikai is."

Several hands are up in the air, but she held up her finger again. "Hold on, let me finish this last part and then I'll answer your questions." Being a teacher was giving her a headache.

"Okay, so all zanpakutous, with one known exception, are capable of reaching a Second Release, or Bankai. This is incredibly rare for a Shinigami to achieve. Usually you're doing pretty good if you can reach Shikai. The abilities and form of one's Bankai is usually just a bigger, stronger version of one's Shikai, but Bankai is desirable because it can potentially increase the power output produced by your Shikai by 5-10 times or more, depending on the user."

Arien scratched her cheek and wrote zanpakutou next to 'Kidou.' "Okay," she said, turning around. "I'll just start from the right. Rael?"

Rael crossed his arms. "These 'zanpakutous' just sound like… modified soul weapons. How were these Shinigami able to create such things?"

She nodded. "Well, this actually relates back to what I said earlier. Over 2000 years ago a Japanese man named Yamamoto met Ravi. J. Loyard, one of Seira's predecessors," she said, gesturing to Seira. "Yamamoto had great strength for a human, primarily due to the large amount of spiritual energy he had, though he didn't know about it since he was still a living human. Ravi J. Loyard was impressed by both Yamamoto's strength and his compassion towards humans, since he only met Yamamoto because he witnessed this human defending a large number of people from thieves by himself. After speaking with him for some time and understanding Yamamoto's will to protect others weaker than him, Ravi J. Loyard told Yamamoto about the Nobles, Lukedonia, the 13 Clans, the Lord, the Noblesse, and some of their abilities, even summoning his soul weapon, the Death Scythe."

Several people in the room look surprised, but she supposed that was to be expected. They apparently had no idea about this chance meeting, and why would they? It probably hadn't been that big of a deal to Ravi J. Loyard for him to report it.

"But wait!" Regis exclaimed. "Why would Seira's predecessor not use mind control to make him forget what he had been told?"

Rael half-stood up. "Regis, are you implying that a predecessor of Seira's would go against protocol?"

Good lord, were he and Seira going out? Is that why he was so defensive of her? Seira herself didn't seem to have any problem with what was being said. Time to step in yet again. Geez, if this was what it was like being a teacher she never wanted to do it for real. But before she could say anything, Principal Lee stepped in.

"Rael, calm down, no one's accusing anyone of anything. Just please let Miss Arien finish." Rael scowled, but nodded at her as he sat back down. Well, it was a start.

"Anyway, even though the Loyard Clan Leader had told Yamamoto this information, he was definitely not planning to leave without using his mind control to erase Yamamoto's memories. Here's the thing. Someone with high spiritual energy is able to resist far more outside influences than a normal human. Just as their reflexes and strength are increased, their mental capabilities are increased as well. And the higher the spiritual energy, the more all of these areas are increased. The true memories were therefore not erased, just dimmed. Yamamoto was able to see both what truly happened and the memory that Ravi J. Loyard implanted."

She took a breath. "I promise I'm answering your question, Rael, just give her a minute," she said, smiling at him.

He scowled again. She smiled wider. He was kind of a cute kid.

"When Yamamoto died he too went to Soul Society of course, only to find that it was a place of chaos and death. Hollows have always been able to enter Soul Society, but when Yamamoto first arrived they were there in legions. The normal souls couldn't defend themselves at all, and the souls with power had no unity. He then decided to create an organization that trained these souls who had power, like himself, to defeat Hollows and protect those who could not protect themselves, and what better to use as a template then a group of people he had learned about in the Human World who did just that?"

She smiled at all of them. It was still kinda strange for her to be talking to so many Nobles. She had never believed that she'd ever see one.

"So Genryusai Yamamoto created the Gotei 13, or 13 Court Guard Squads, after the 13 Clans. Each squad had a Captain, the Shinigami equivalent of a Clan Leader. One of the first men recruited by Yamamoto created the Asauchi based on Yamamoto's description of soul weapons. You could certainly call them modified soul weapons, since they are based on soul weapons, but since they reflect the soul and power of the person wielding it, not their predecessors, they are fundamentally different."

She grinned at Seira. "As memento to your predecessor, Yamamoto requested that only one form not be available for Shikai: a scythe. To this day no Shinigami has ever had a zanpakutou that takes the form of a true scythe."

She sat down on the stool behind the podium and looked around. "Any more questions?" She was pretty sure Rael wasn't the only one who had raised his hand.

Kentas raised his hand. She gestured for him to continue.

"If Shinigami use weapons to fight Hollows, do the Hollows have weapons as well? Or are they easily killed?"

Huh. She hadn't explained Hollow abilities yet, had she? Damn.

Muzaka let out a bark-like laugh. "Well, if they're anything like Dark Spear I'm guessing they fight back.

She smirked and nodded at Muzaka.

"No, Hollows are not easily killed. Hollow weapons are a little harder to explain because they are a bit more diverse. Hmm, how should I put this?" she mused as she stared at the board.

"So I'll start by describing a Hollow's appearance." That should help. Hopefully.

"So you may have assumed that a Hollow would just look like a human spirit, but it is way weirder than that. Hollows can be any size, from human-sized to as tall as this school. They also can be any shape – they're not necessarily going to be humanoid. Most, uh, garden variety Hollows, shall we say, are roughly five times the size of a normal human, though they can be smaller or larger. They tend to be shaped like animals, specifically insects, arachnids, crustaceans, and other similarly shaped creatures."

She looked around and saw incredulous expressions. She sighed. "Yeah, I know it sounds strange, you'll just have to trust me."

She had never thought of Hollows being weird or strange before. She had always been around Hollows in one way or another. But saying it out loud made it sound kinda ridiculous. Oh well. It was true, after all, but unlike with the other dimensions, She wasn't about to go capture a Hollow and bring it here just for the sake of convincing them.

"Even if you've never seen a Hollow before, they are very easily identifiable for a number of reasons. The first is what I just told you, their strange shape and size. But though a Hollow's size and shape can vary greatly from Hollow to Hollow, every Hollow does have two defining characteristics: a hole and a mask."

She turned around and drew a shaded circle on the board to represent a Hollow hole.

"The hole will normally be near the center of the Hollow, typically around the chest area. It appears when corrosion claims the entirety of the Chain of Fate and signifies the loss of their heart. It is because of this that most Hollows are incapable of feeling emotions the way they once did."

"Their heart doesn't just disappear. It simply transforms and becomes their abilities. Hollow abilities vary greatly. Some Hollows don't really have any combat capabilities at all. These are the ones that became Hollows without a very strong will or personality, those without any real convictions, those with a weak-willed heart. Other Hollows have physical attributes that make them dangerous, like claws, scales, or spikes on their body. And some Hollows have strong, personalized powers. These stronger Hollows are more likely to retain their speech and mental capabilities, a trait that not all Hollows have, making them even more dangerous. The ability to control others or produce explosives are some examples of their powers."

There were plenty of examples, but a few should be enough. There was really no telling what these guys would run into if they met a Hollow, so best not to lead them on and make them think they'd get a specific power when really all bets were off. Even though she seriously doubted any normal Hollows could hold a candle to any of these guys.

"The second defining characteristic of a Hollow is its mask. All Hollows have a white mask that covers at least a portion of their face. For garden variety Hollows, the entirety of their face is covered with a white mask. The masks also vary in shape, and the shape of the mask is guided by the heart, just like their abilities. The mask protects the mass of instinct that is a Hollow, as well as hiding the face of the human they once were."

She drew a generic mask on the board beneath 'Hollows.'

"For the most part, these are the most dangerous Hollows that you will find in the Human World. Now, when I say dangerous, I mean dangerous to normal souls and low-level Shinigami. Not y'all. I know I haven't really seen y'all's combat abilities, but I still have no doubt that you guys would not even break a sweat if you ever had to take on one of these kinds of Hollows."

Muzaka raised his hand, eyes curious.

" _These_ kinds of Hollows? Are there different types of Hollows?"

Well, obviously, she had just set that up to explain that. Muzaka did seem pretty muscle-headed though. Maybe he wanted to know if there were any Hollows strong enough to take him on.

"Technically, there is only one type of Hollow, the ones I just mentioned. But there is a subcategory of Hollow that differs greatly from normal Hollows and are therefore usually treated as a whole other type of Hollow. These Hollows are called Menos."

She took a moment to gather her thoughts as Tao clattered away on his laptop.

"All Menos start out as garden variety Hollows, but Menos are Hollows that are so strong and individualized that the power held in a normal soul cannot satiate them. They therefore go after the more powerful and fulfilling souls of their fellow Hollows. If one of these Hollows survives the battle to eat others without being eaten long enough then he evolves into a Menos Grande or Gillian."

Arien shivered slightly. She had first seen the gruesome fights these Hollows held when she was a little girl, and it truly was survival of the fittest.

"This is the first of three levels that a Menos can reach. Gillian are Hollows that are the size of large buildings. The majority of them look exactly alike: they are huge, they appear to be cloaked in black, and they have a large white mask with a long, pointed nose. Menos rarely ever appear in the Human World because they eat other Hollows, not Pluses, but if a Menos Grande _does_ appear then an average Shinigami is incapable of taking it down. However, they are certainly not impossible to defeat. Gillian have an enormous amount of spiritual energy compared to the average Shinigami, but they have little to no intelligence, are extremely slow, and have very poor reflexes, so a powerful enough Shikai is usually enough to take one down."

She wrote 'Gillian' underneath the mask she had just drawn.

"Sometimes, though, when a Hollow evolves into a Menos Grande, their mask does not quite resemble the other Menos Grande. These are Menos whose strong wills and hearts have won out over the hundreds of Hollows it has consumed. The process then starts over again, with the strange Menos Grande eating its fellow Hollows, including its fellow Menos Grande, to assuage their hunger and gain power. Eventually they evolve into the second level of Menos: Adjuchas."

"Adjuchas are generally where the problems starts for even the strongest Shinigami. They tend to be smaller than Gillian, but unlike Gillian, they have intellect, incredible reflexes and superior speed. They also have a greater spiritual pressure than Gillian and unique Hollow capabilities on top of everything else, so they are quite powerful."

She shrugged her shoulders slightly, writing 'Adjuchas' on the board before turning back around. It had been a long time since she had struggled to beat an Adjuchas, but that was how it was for most Shinigami so she would just go with it.

"Adjuchas must constantly struggle to maintain their level, however, unlike the other two classes, as they are the only ones with the possibility of devolving. If any part of a Menos is eaten then their evolution stops there. This is true for Adjuchas as well, but Adjuchas must continually eat high-level Hollows or they will devolve back into a normal Menos Grande and stay that way. Since this is one of only two stages where a Hollow can regain some semblance of intelligence and emotion, you can imagine that devolving into a mindless beast is not something a rational being would want to occur. The majority of Adjuchas are either killed and eaten, frozen at the Adjuchas state by having someone eat a part of them, or they devolve."

"And finally, the last level. The last level a Menos can reach is called Vasto Lorde. These Hollows are the ones that are very close to human in shape, though they usually have animal characteristics like fangs or wings. Their power dwarfs those of all the other Hollows. As far as spiritual energy goes, a Vasto Lorde's power is greater than even the Captains of the Gotei 13, the strongest Shinigami Soul Society has to offer. Luckily for them, Vasto Lorde rarely ever venture into the Human World. In addition, their numbers are incredibly small. You can usually count the number of Vasto Lorde in Hueco Mundo on the fingers of one hand."

She scratched the back of her neck, debating with herself. There was no real harm in telling them, was there? Especially since she had already told them so much already.

"There is also another subcategory of Hollow called Arrancar. These are Hollows who have removed their masks and gained power similar to that of a Shinigami. Your average Hollow taking off its mask isn't really going to affect its power, but if an Adjuchas or Vasto Lorde level Menos does it, the result increases their already substantial power, as well as making them more like a human as far as emotions and rationality goes. However, I would say that true Arrancar are just as rare, if not rarer, than Vasto Lorde, so their existence is usually ignored."

Ignored by normal Shinigami, that was. Of course, normal Shinigami weren't even taught of the _existence_ of Adjuchas and Vasto Lorde, let alone Arrancar. But Arien had personally fought with a powerful Vasto Lorde turned Arrancar just a few days ago, and if she had been in a normal frame of mind when it had happened it would have been both exhilarating and terrifying.

She shook her head. No time to dwell on that fight and the trigger behind it. Best to stay focused.

"Okay, any questions?"

No one raised their hands. She was about to turn around and continue when Arien saw Takeo slowly raise his hand out of the corner of her eye.

"What is it, Takeo?" she asked.

"Well. This is a more general question but, why hasn't anyone here seen a Hollow or Shinigami? Or just a soul in general? Don't get me wrong, I'm not doubting what you're saying but… Tao and I used to travel all over the place doing missions. We haven't lived for very long, true, but still. Nothing? And almost everyone else here has lived far longer than us. Why have we never seen anything from the spiritual world?"

Arien shrugged and shook her head. "Honestly, I do not know the answer to that. Though I know a good deal about the spiritual world, I know very little about Nobles and practically nothing about werewolves. However, I have come up with a general theory if you'd like to hear it."

She looked at him questionably and he nodded. "I don't even have that so whatever you think it is will be information I didn't have," he said, smiling a little.

She smiled back at him. He seemed to be one of the more chill members of the group, and she liked him for it.

She took a deep breath. "To be honest, my best explanation as to why you and Tao have not seen a soul before is, as you've said, you have not been alive for very long. But more than that, I know I make it sound like seeing a soul is as common as seeing a Starbucks, but that is not the case at all. Souls that remain in the Human World are extremely rare, and the ones that do remain are very good at hiding themselves as I said before. However, that explanation doesn't really hold out for the others here who have lived much longer and probably travelled more, as you said."

"So my theory is this: you guys are Hollow repellants."

She let that sink in for a moment before extrapolating.

"Again, this is just my theory, but based on what I have seen I believe it to be plausible.

"Not long after I woke up in your house, it became clear to her that none of y'all were really making an effort to curb your energy. It was also clear that though your energies were definitely different from mine and I had never felt them before, I never questioned that what you were emitting was spiritual energy. It was then that I realized that my own Hollows were clearly not interested in what was going on like they normally would have been. I assumed then that you had put some kind of barrier that protected against Hollows around your house and that was subduing my Hollows. And I will explain that in a minutes, just hold on," she said firmly as yet more hands arose. She had forgotten she hadn't explained about herself yet. Too late now, pressing on.

"But when I left your house there was clearly no such barrier in place. After spending an hour restoring energy to Raizel's soul using spiritual energy and it clearly having worked, there did not seem to be a question as to what kind of energy you guys used. Despite the fact that y'all aren't technically human, souls are souls are souls, and souls use spiritual energy."

"However, though it seems that you use spiritual energy just like a Shinigami or a Hollow, there is a definite difference in your reiryoku, or spiritual pressure. This is a materialization of the quantity of spiritual energy a soul has. Normal souls and living humans have little to no reiryoku, whereas Captains have an inordinate amount. As you might expect, typically the higher your reiryoku, the higher your spiritual energy, and vice versa. Hollows actively seek out those with higher reiryoku because they taste better to them and provide more energy and power, which is why they rarely ever go after living humans."

She gathered her thoughts a bit.

"I'm sorry if this seems a little jumbled, but i have a point, I swear. The point is, that small but definite difference in both of y'all reiryokus from a Shinigami's makes all the difference. I think it is highly likely that this difference repels Hollows, or at least makes them uninterested in the souls of Nobles and werewolves. It would explain why none of you have ever seen one despite having unchecked power that every over-confident Hollow would want to consume."

"As for you three," she pointed at Tao, Takeo and the Chairman, "you guys, though human, also do not emit the same kind of energy a normal human soul emits. Your souls feel more like a combination of Hollow and Noble, both of which would be unappetizing for a Hollow based on my theory. M-21 of course, emits werewolf energy, which would also be unappetizing. The rest of you emit either pure werewolf or Noble energy, so by my theory's rules none of you would not ever be attacked by a simple Hollow."

She shrugged again, frowning slightly. "I realize this theory wouldn't exactly hold up in court, but it's the best I've got right not."

Takeo nodded, giving his thanks while doing so. Just as she was about to continue, Principal Lee spoke up, his chin resting lightly in his hand as he mused aloud.

"It certainly does seem plausible. From what you have told us about Hollows, it wouldn't be at all that surprising for them to go after beings with such high amounts of power as us, especially if they are not all that intelligent. Surely at least _one_ Hollow would have attacked at least _one_ of us if they believed it would help them grow stronger. Not to mention that both Nobles and werewolves rely completely on their souls in order to ensure their bodies function properly. If something happens to their souls, it would greatly disrupt their physical health," his eyes darkened slightly as he glanced at Raizel.

"Can you imagine the chaos that would befall a clan if their Clan Leader's soul was eaten by a Hollow? And if a Hollow could eat the soul of a Clan Leader, who's to say they could not also absorb their soul weapon as well?"

There was silence around the room as that sunk in.

"It could even be an evolutionary trait, that Nobles and werewolves' souls evolved to emit an energy that Hollows would not be interested in. Though it does not explain Dark Spear," he added.

Oh?

"Can Dark Spear absorb souls?" she asked curiously.

Frankenstein nodded, but did not elaborate.

"Well it is not unheard of for an Inner Hollow to still be able to absorb the souls of others, though it is rare. Plus, Dark Spear is not exactly a normal Hollow, so it would not do to debunk the theory purely based on him, especially since if we toss that theory the only thing I have left is confusion as to why none of y'all have ever been attacked by a Hollow."

She stared at nothing for a minute before shaking her head and turning back to the board.

"Okay, I'm getting close to finishing guys, so bear with me. The last kind of being I want to talk to you about are called Quincy. The Quincy are a rather unique type of spiritual being. In some ways they are closer to Nobles or werewolves than Hollows or Shinigami, since they do not need to die to use their powers and have a physical body that can be seen by humans. Their spiritual energy is similar to a Shinigami or a Hollow's – they have more than a normal human. Their innate spiritual energy allows them to see spirits such as Hollows, but it's their other prowess that allows them to fight them. Quincy are capable of and most known for their abilities to absorb reishi, or spiritual particles, from the air around them. Now, all beings absorb reishi to some extent, but Quincy have an exponentially higher absorption rate than any other being, and they are able to add this energy directly to their own, as well as create spiritual weapons from it. The weapon of choice for a Quincy is the bow and arrow, and both the bow and arrows are created exclusively from reishi gathered from the atmosphere."

That should do for now. The chances of them running in to another Quincy were about as rare as running into a true Arrancar, so this basic amount of information should suffice.

"Any questions?" she asked.

No hands were up. Okay, on to the fun part.

She stretched her back a bit before erasing the board.

"So now I'm going to tell you a bit about myself. It's not that big of a deal, really," she shrugged. "Now you know about the four main types of spiritual beings: Hollows, Shinigami, Quincy, as well as humans.

"Well, I'm a combination of all four. I was created in a lab by a man who was trying to gather data on what happened when these kinds of beings' energy and DNA were mixed. I was originally created using the DNA of a human and a pure-blooded Quincy, and the spiritual energy of dozens of powerful Shinigami. I survived longer than most of the others, a couple of months, maybe a year, before I too died, overwhelmed by the immense spiritual energy now residing in my soul. Not long after that, the man who created me abandoned the lab and its inhabitants since he had gotten the data he needed, and we were obviously not going to succeed because we had not been created to succeed. Not long after that I gained the power of a Hollow, similar to Dark Spear in that they have their own personalities, yet are still a part of me. This, combined with a seal that mimicked the physical body of a human, allowed me to continue living as a soul."

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** Yay, the explanation chapters are done! Well, the bulk of them. There are some things that I purposely didn't explain that I will later on (I mean, we can't have _everything_ on the table right now, that's no fun), and you will learn more and more about Arien and her abilities/backstory as the chapters progress.

Also, I don't count Dark Rukia as far as the 'wielding a scythe' goes. As cool as she is, she's non-canon to me lol.

Also also, a Descorrer is just the term for the specific kind of Garganta Arrancar use. It's the one that kinda looks like a jaw opening as opposed to the kind of 'rip in the curtain' that other Hollows use.

I may come back and edit this chapter a bit later, but i figured i should just go ahead and post it instead of muddling it to death.

Post reviews please, let me know what you think, about this chapter or any other ones, or about the story in general!


	14. Chapter 14

Muzaka lounged comfortably in his seat, staring thoughtfully down at his empty plate without really seeing it.

Arien's closing statement about her origins had made everyone tense up, including himself. None of them liked the idea of anyone being experimented on, as they had all experienced it, directly or indirectly, themselves.

He could almost see Frankenstein's Mother Hen instincts rearing up at the mere thought of this woman in a lab tank.

Despite the sympathy and empathy that the group felt towards her, no one spoke. To ask for any kind of detail or further explanation would no doubt bring up personal and horrendous memories. Muzaka, for one, had certainly noticed how she had said 'we,' not just 'I,' and the finality with which she had said they were 'failures.' And he doubted that he was the only one who noticed. It was hard to ask questions or even provide comfort when doing so was just a reminder of the traumatic experiences both sides had experienced.

He himself had felt the least qualified to offer comfort. Though he was acutely aware of the pain that came from losing someone, he was also the only one who had ever undergone experiments for his own personal gain. Not that he was still undergoing them, but he had more-or-less known what he was in store for when he met Crombell and he had accepted it anyway.

Being friends with Raizel for so long had taught him a good deal about how to break the ice, but he kept silent this time. He was sure the others would be able to provide much better consolation if and when the occasion arose.

But before anyone could say anything, Raizel's phone had starting going off and Raizel had stood up, informing everyone that it was time for breakfast. Frankenstein had reacted then, apologizing deeply for not keeping an eye on the time and delaying his precious Master's breakfast, as well as herding everyone out of the school and back to the house. Arien had seemed bemused by the whole scene, especially how they all insisted on her joining them.

Muzaka smiled at the memory. He was curious how much of that was Frankenstein being genuinely upset or if it had been his way of diffusing the situation. Probably a little of both. But it had worked out perfectly, helping everyone in the room to stop dwelling on their past for a minute and instead fret over relatively meaningless things like making breakfast.

When they had gotten to the house the three modified humans had moved the couches and little table out of the way to make room for a long table, complete with tasteful and matching chairs. Muzaka had briefly wondered if Frankenstein owned anything that didn't match at least one other thing before picking a seat and sitting down.

Most of the household either began preparing breakfast or stood around without anything to do, though a few did sit down, like Raizel. He had figured that Raizel would sit at the head of the table and was not disappointed. Muzaka had decided to sit in the middle of the table as opposed to by Raizel, mostly just to see if anyone besides his family would deign to sit next to him. His plan was quickly cut short, though, as the few warriors who had come with him seemed to have taken it upon themselves to ensure that he was never alone. Garda and Lunark sat down on either side of him while Kentas sat almost directly across from him. He found their commitment heart-warming if a bit exasperating.

Though in all honesty, perhaps they just stuck to him so closely because they felt out of place. He could definitely understand that. He was the guy that had almost killed Raizel, and Lunark and Kentas had been direct enemies of the household until a few days ago.

It was one of the reasons why he kept making it a point to look as relaxed and comfortable as he possibly could so that maybe they would relax a bit themselves. They probably assumed that he really felt right at home, but that was not the case. He was just better at hiding it than they were.

Oh he certainly didn't feel in danger physically, he just knew he was not truly welcome here. He didn't mind. He did not expect any of them to forgive him; in fact, it was almost a relief to know that they despised what he had done, and by extension despised him. It was a quiet bit of symmetry to how he felt about himself.

The delicious smell of cooked meat finally dragged him from his reverie, and he looked up to see Arien, Seira, and Frankenstein all in pink aprons serving food. The rest of the household had sat down while he had been lost in thought, he noted, and there was already a large plate full of bacon, eggs, and bread in front of him.

Arien and Seira took the last two places at the table when it became clear that Frankenstein was going to remain standing respectfully behind Raizel instead of joining them. Muzaka felt his stomach growl and realized how hungry he was – the food that Arien had made them seemed like days ago. He was just about to dig in when he noticed that no one else had even picked up their chopsticks.

He paused, sending a questioning glance towards Frankenstein. Who smirked ever so slightly and ignored him. He considered the thought that Frankenstein was doing this purely to mess with him – he hadn't forgotten the exploding drink – but quickly disregarded that notion. Though Frankenstein was clearly not above messing with him, Muzaka didn't think he could get everyone, including Raizel, in on a prank without any time to plan.

Speaking of Raizel.

Muzaka glanced over at him, noticing that he wasn't eating either, just staring intently into his bowl of food. Why Raizel had a bowl instead of a plate was beyond Muzaka, but maybe that was why no one was eating. If _Raizel_ wanted to wait, than he bet no one was gonna say a damn thing about it, and eating before him would be rude.

He turned back to his food, catching Kentas's eye as he did. Muzaka just smiled a little and shook his head at Kentas's confused expression, hoping that Kentas would understand that nothing was wrong or anything. The confused expression did not leave Kentas's face, and he could tell that the unknown and unexplained situation was making Lunark and Garda a little tense as well.

It looked like it was once again up to him to break the ice.

He was surprised when Arien broke it first, though.

"Is there a specific reason why everyone is letting their food get cold?" Her tone was mild and polite, but her raised eyebrow indicated that the reason had better be a damn good one.

Everyone relaxed a fraction at her question, as if they had all wanted to explain their behavior but hadn't dared break the silence. Muzaka grinned a little. It was nice not having to be the one to always break the ice.

It was Raizel who answered, without looking away from his bowl.

"I am waiting for the serving to grow," he said, his voice very serious.

What? Muzaka felt his eyebrows contract a little in confusion, and he wasn't the only one. Arien was actually looking genuinely upset, and Muzaka decided that he'd take Round 2 of ice-breaking. He didn't want her to say something that would upset Raizel. Or, more accurately, something that would upset Frankenstein and the other Nobles for daring to question Raizel.

"What the hell do you mean, waiting for the serving to grow?" he asked a little loudly, smiling a little at Raizel. He really was a weird, interesting guy.

It was Frankenstein who answered.

"Master enjoys watching the noodles in the ramen absorb the soup around it. When this happens the amount of noodles appears to increase."

Huh. Well, he didn't really know what that meant, but whatever. He was used to Raizel's weirdness. Instead of commenting, he glanced at Arien.

Arien's expression was somewhere between confusion and pouting as she said, "So, you deliberately wait for the noodles to taste bad before eating it?"

Raizel just nodded as he finally picked up his chopsticks and began eating, prompting everyone else to follow suit.

Arien looked around the room like she was watching a play put on by lunatics. Muzaka chuckled as he took his first few bites of the now-lukewarm food.

"Don't worry about it Arien, you get used to it after a while." She looked at him with a slightly lost expression before shrugging and eating her breakfast.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N** : So I was able to write this one really quickly and wanted to go ahead and post it to make up for the super long previous chapters. I know they might seem tedious but since I had to describe an entire _Universe_ I couldn't think of a good way to do it piece-meal that would be in-character for both the Noblesse characters and my OC, as well as fit with my overall story outline.

So here, have some ramen for bearing with me :)

Review and all that jazz! ^.^


	15. Chapter 15

_Hey guys, so I just wanted to say that I don't think the last chapter updated/loaded properly, so if you haven't read about Breakfast with the Franky Family then go back a chapter, otherwise this one won't make as much sense ^.^_

 _Byyyeeee~~_

* * *

Frankenstein bowed subtly but respectfully at the affirmation of the query he had sent his Master over their connection. Waving and smiling at the children, he closed the door.

The children came to pick up Master, Regis, and Seira every morning. Well, at least the girls did. Half of the time Shinwoo overslept, causing Ikhan to be tardy as well, and preventing both of them from having the time to stop by the house.

He smiled slightly, still facing the door but not seeing it. It had really become a morning routine, by now: Master spending his time choosing an outfit while drinking his tea, eating ramen at the table with the other household members, and finally walking with the children, as well as himself and the parachute trio more often than not, to the school. And always his Master was surrounded by people who cared deeply for him.

Today, though, instead of joining his Master on the way to the school, he had decided to take the day off. As much as he loathed letting even more paperwork pile up, he could not let five strangers wander the house without supervision. Not that he blatantly _distrusted_ any of the people left in the house, but it would be asinine to just blindly trust. Look at what had happened with pseudo-M-24. Until recently Lunark and Kentas had been high-level Union execs, Garda and Arien were still unknowns and Muzaka was, well, Muzaka.

He would not leave them unsupervised, and the only person besides himself who would be able to defend himself should it come to blows would be Master. The chances of that happening were relatively low, sure, but he would not risk his Master's health if he could do otherwise. Not to mention a break from work would give him a chance to contemplate all that had happened in the last 36 hours, from the relief of saving M-21, the torment of almost losing Master, and the gratitude and curiosity brought on by Miss Arien.

She was created from an experiment. Frankenstein knew about humanity's insatiable thirst for power firsthand, but it still pained him to see the damage inflicted on the victims. He couldn't help but draw the connection between her circumstances and M-21's, and it made him feel all the more upset about what she had experienced. Not to mention she was almost certainly very young, perhaps even a teenager. She did not quite act like a young woman, but Union experiments had really only made large leaps in human enhancements in the past decade or so, so someone with her abilities would likely be one of their later experiments.

Her explanation had been long but interesting, and certainly not implausible. It basically amounted to, humans had souls that either passed on or devolved into creatures who only thought about their own pain and anger, and some of these souls had more power than others. It was the same with any culture, really. Nobles had criminals, elites, and ordinary citizens, so to speak, as did werewolves and living humans. Each of the beings' abilities she described were fascinating and a bit strange, but they had seen at least some proof that what she said was true.

The mystery of her soul weapon was somewhat resolved: she was part Shinigami, so she had one of these zanpakutous. She had not gone into any detail about its abilities, but there had been no real need for her too. She certainly didn't seem to mean them any harm, but there was no benefit from divulging your powers to complete strangers. Regardless, it seemed clear that her zanpakutou allowed her to both heal (M-21) and fight (the assassination squad members).

Her ability to heal Master had also been partly explained. She was half-Quincy, someone with the power to freely and easily manipulate the energy all around them. He assumed the technique she used to transfer said energy into the soul of his Master was also that of a Quincy, but for now it was enough to know the general knowledge of how it had been accomplished.

As far as he knew she had not revealed the abilities of her 'Inner Hollow,' as she had put it, but he was already intimately acquainted with those kinds of powers, so it did not hold quite the interest over him as her other powers did.

The gush of running water and the clink of dishes brought him out of his thoughts. He turned to find Miss Arien in one of the pink aprons and a pair of pink kitchen gloves scrubbing the dirty dishes in a sink full of bubbles. Muzaka stood beside her, watching her rinse dishes like it was the most entertaining activity created by man, while the other three hovered somewhat awkwardly around them.

He frowned a little and sighed inwardly. As happy as he was seeing the dirty dishes being taken care of, it was not Arien's responsibility to clean them. She had already done enough for them, and she wasn't even an official member of the household. He had actually planned on making Muzaka wash them. Not that Muzaka was an official member – his Master had offered, but as far as he knew Muzaka hadn't say yea or nay yet – Frankenstein just didn't want to pass up a chance to see the former Werewolf Lord in a pink apron reduced to doing menial chores.

Regardless, it was nice to see the young lady had proper social etiquette, offering not only to help cook but also to clean up.

He cleared his throat as he walked up behind them (not wanting any misunderstandings) and moved to stand on the other side of Arien.

"Miss Arien, I truly do appreciate all the help you have given us." He smiled charmingly at her before glancing towards Muzaka. "I would ask Muzaka to assist you, but I'm not sure he is up to such a simple task." Any chance he got to make a jab at Muzaka. He deftly moved in between him and Arien so he could start drying the dishes Arien had washed.

Muzaka just chuckled a little.

Despite Muzaka's notorious temper, it was difficult to incite him with just snarky remarks. He would have to try harder.

Miss Arien glanced between the two of them, a knowing smile growing slowly on her face.

"Oh, I don't mind," she said artlessly. "In fact, I just declined Muzaka's gracious offer to help me, on the grounds that I presumed you wanted your dishes and sink in one piece." She smiled sweetly over at Muzaka before turning back to the dishes.

Frankenstein let out a chuckle of his own at Muzaka's expense. He had assumed he would be the only one brave enough to even attempt to knowingly annoy someone as powerful as Muzaka, but it seemed he was wrong. Arien had flawlessly picked up on the antagonistic vibe between the two and played along by delivering a backhanded compliment of her own.

Though it was very likely that Arien did not know about Muzaka's incredible strength and former title. She had informed them about her knowledge of Nobles, but she had admitted that she had very little insight about werewolves, so it was entirely possible that she was simply playing along because Muzaka was fun to mess around with. Provided he didn't get legitimately angry, of course.

When the dishes were done he took off his own pair of kitchen gloves and held his hands out for Arien to pass him her apron and gloves so he could store them properly.

"Well, since we're all here why don't I give you all a more thorough tour of the house?" That way he could show Kentas and Garda the living quarters and Arien the lab without singling any of them out. He didn't want anything, especially the lab, to come as a surprise at a later date, and this would give him a chance to show Arien that they had nothing to hide. He just had to hope the lab wouldn't, ah, trigger her.

The majority of the house was relatively mundane, if large. He pointed out doors that led to bathrooms and bedrooms, indicating if the bedrooms were taken and by who. As they made their way downstairs he showed them the computer room, the indoor pool and the game room, informing them about each room's purpose. The others seemed content to let him talk without interrupting.

Finally Frankenstein led them down the hall towards the lab. One of the labs. The main lab. Everyone but Arien had already seen it, so he kept an eye on her to watch for any negative reaction, particularly one that would result in the destruction of the lab.

But his wariness was unwarranted it seemed. Arien showed only a little surprise upon seeing the lab as they walked through the door. Certainly nothing that showed she was upset that there was one down here or that she was distraught that he had brought her to one. He was actually willing to bet she had shown more emotion when he had told them that the room full of computers were used for the express purpose of playing games.

He had expected her to panic, but the fact that she hadn't made him even more confident in his Master's decision. Not that he wouldn't have followed through if she _had_ been upset, it just made the transition for all of them easier. If Master trusted someone then there was always a good reason.

After they had made their way back up into the house proper he showed Garda and Kentas to two empty rooms. He had already extended an invitation to Lunark for her and Kentas to stay here, and she had cautiously accepted. Garda, apparently, was an avid follower of Muzaka, so it remained to be seen if she would stay or not. Garda and Muzaka had at least agreed to stay long enough for Frankenstein to ensure that no permanent damage had been inflicted on their bodies from experiments, and that would take at least a week, so for now everyone got their own room.

Lunark and Muzaka stayed with Garda and Kentas as they explored their new rooms. Or, more than likely, searched for any video cameras or other data-gathering devices the scary scientist had planted in there. He smiled a little to himself. He was pretty sure M-21, Tao, and Takeo had all done the same thing with their rooms. It didn't bother him because he knew there was nothing in there, and discovering nothing would help them trust the household members a little more.

Frankenstein accompanied Arien to her own bedroom door, deciding that his was as good as time as any to propose his offer.

"Miss Arien, if I may ask, what do you plan on doing now?" After all, unlike the Parachute Trio, it was entirely possible that she had a home to return to.

Her hand paused on the doorknob, eyes widening momentarily before narrowing a little.

"I'm not really sure," she replied vaguely. "I hadn't really thought too much about it." A small frown appeared as she said this.

He smiled encouragingly at her. "I only asked because if you did not have anything to take care of, then you could stay here with us."

'Anything to take care of' sounded better than 'a home to return to.' Just like when he invited M-21 to stay with them, there was no need to throw that in her face. But from her reaction it seemed as though he still was not tactful enough.

Instead of looking surprised or suspicious, her eyes tightened. It was a look he had seen on his Master's face often: A look of pure loneliness and pain. The look in her eyes held such weight that for a moment he questioned his assumption that she was a 'young' woman.

Then her expression cleared, becoming a blank mask.

"Thank you for the offer," she said somewhat monotonously. "I will… think… about it."

She nodded respectfully at him, eyes unseeing, and walked into her room, leaving him standing in the hallway looking at a plain door and wondering what exactly this woman had gone through.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** So in the extras and in Noblesse S it's revealed that there is indeed a room with a bunch of computers Franky created so Rai could have fun/get better at playing video games, and there is also an indoor pool in his house. Idk if there is a game room, like with pool and stuff, but I wouldn't put it past him lol

Thanks for reading! .


	16. Chapter 16

_Hey everyone! So I decided to change what I had been doing and write Arien in third person. I think it'll make things easier both for me and the readers, so unless I receive, like, a flood of upset reviews or something please know that I plan to continue doing so for the rest of the story, as well as eventually going back and updating the past chapters._

 _Byyyeeee~~_

* * *

Arien sat cross-legged on the bed. Her hands were on her knees with palms facing up, fingers comfortably curled. Her eyes were closed.

Energy circled gently around her, concentrated around her chest, calm but purposeful.

Anyone who saw her would assume that she was simply meditating, emptying her mind to achieve enlightenment.

But, Arien thought, if she could do that she wouldn't be doing jinzen.

Arien opened her eyes when she felt the familiar pressure of entering her Inner World around her and looked around. She moved slowly through the fog, fog so dense she could not see more than a meter in any direction. The ground that she walked on changed from white sand to grey gravel to green grass, from forests with tree tops so tall they disappeared to cities with skyscrapers miles high to vast oceans with enormous waves that resembled mountains. Sometimes everything was tilted or upside down. Sometimes there was half a sun, or three moons, or just one small star. Her inner world constantly shifted, rearranged, transformed, and reformed, consistent only in its inconsistency.

It was as if there was everything and nothing here.

As if summoned by this thought a young woman materialized out of the fog, falling into step beside Arien like she'd been there the whole time. Which, in a way, she had.

Arien looked fondly at her for a moment. From a distant one might think her hair was black, but up close it was clear that it was dark blue, intermixed with so many different shades of blue that it always made Arien wonder how someone could think a simple word like 'blue' was enough to describe it all. The red slippers on her feet were comprised of glowing embers, and her skin was the color of freshly dug-up earth. Her simple, floor-length gown, though it appeared to be silk, was actually formed of soft white clouds that moved effortlessly when she moved, and even though there was no breeze to be felt both her hair and her gown wafted lazily around her figure.

But the thing that Arien loved most about her was her eyes. Because like Arien's Inner World, the color and shape of her eyes changed constantly, from red quartz to yellow diamonds to emeralds and countless more. When Arien was little she had spent hours just watching her zanpakutou's eyes shift from one hue to the next.

She smiled at the memory before quickly sobering. That had been a long time ago, before….

The fog thickened and she stopped walking, making a physical and mental effort to stop her thoughts in their tracks. The fog eased back to its previous thickness.

She received a pointed look from her companion. Arien smiled at her.

"I know. I'm sorry about the weather." Her zanpakutou nodded, accepting the apology without placing blame.

They continued to walk for an unknowable amount of time before Arien spoke up again.

"So where are Nike and Aceso?" She asked. Normally when she visited the two of them at least greeted her, though while Aceso's greetings were always quite normal and civilized, Nike's idea of a greeting usually involved swords and ceros.

Her companion's voice was as soft and melodious as wind through tall grass as she said, "After you released you seal I managed to convince them to lay low for the time being." Meaning that they had both joined their powers and bodies with that of the non-Hollow part of her zanpakutou. Then her walking companion frowned slightly. "Though Nike has been appearing sporadically." That would explain why she had been able to speak to Nike earlier today. "She now knows that you are surrounded by opponents she deems worthy, and cannot seem to completely control her desire to do battle with them." Her zanpakutou, though never shying away from a fight, did not quite agree with the aggressiveness and reckless abandon Nike seemed to employ.

Arien took a deep breath. "I see," she responded somberly. That meant that her soul had been even more unstable than she had previously thought, if it was necessary for Nike and Aceso to subdue their powers by allowing the Shinigami part of her soul control. She sighed. She should have seen this coming. She had released her seal twice in a short period of time, and hadn't entered into a gigai afterwards. Without a gigai it was hard for her human heritage to outweigh the incredible power and influence of her two Hollows.

And speaking of human heritage.

"So what do you think I should do?" She knew her zanpakutou had heard everything. They were the same being, after all.

"What do you want to do?" was the response she got.

This was why she had come here. It wasn't like she hadn't thought about what she wanted to do. Of course she had. But something about being in her Inner World and the implacability of her zanpakutou always helped clear her mind, helped her see past herself and her problems and allowed her to think clearly.

What _did_ she want to do?

She wanted to go back home. She wanted to be surrounded by her family again. To check on each one of them and ask them how they were doing, to personally make sure that each one was stable and healthy. To tell them about the new techniques she had learned and the concepts she had proven or disproven. To hear them talk about their day and what they wanted to do when they got out into the real world. To just hear and see them again, and be able to tell them that everything was going to be okay, because she would protect them no matter what.

She closed her eyes and stopped walking as the tears starting falling. Unbeknownst to her the fog thickened and darkened until it looked like a vast and oppressive thundercloud.

How long she cried, she did not know. Time was so subjective.

But eventually she lifted her chin and wiped the tears away.

She could not live like this, could not go on like this. Unchecked regret and remorse, no matter how well-justified or well-meaning, caused only stagnation or regression.

She took a deep breath and opened her eyes. Her zanpakutou was nowhere in sight, but it didn't matter. She knew what Arien had decided. So with her decision firmly made she continued to walk through her inner world before disappearing into the slowly clearing fog.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** Jinzen is a Bleach term that refers to mediating (usually with you zanpakutou on you lap) so that you can enter your Inner World (the source of your powers, kinda like a Shinigami's soul) and converse with your zanpakutou.

In Bleach canon, your emotions and any lack of will is reflected in your Inner World. The changing scenery of Arien's is normal, but the fog is not and represents her sadness and regret brought on by the death of her family. More information on that later.


	17. Chapter 17

Muzaka sat on the railing of the balcony, one leg dangling over the edge.

His family had settled in, each one deciding to catch some sleep while they had the chance. He left them to it. What little sleep he had been getting lately had been plagued by nightmares and memories. Again and again he watched his beautiful little daughter die, relived the crushing pain and desperate hatred and absolute fury.

Sleeping no longer held any appeal to him.

His fist tightened on the rail, causing the metal to screech in protest.

Humans. He had liked them, had advocated to protect them, had spent a large portion of his life with them, had even found his previous mate among them.

And they were responsible for Ashleen's death.

His vision started to blur as his hatred festered and grew inside of him.

"Fucking bastards," he growled, staring out over the yard but not seeing it.

"Who is?" a curious feminine voice asked from his left.

He whipped his head around and saw Arien standing in the doorway in a white T-shirt and grey shorts. Her pale blue eyes pierced him with a look he could not quite decipher. He narrowed his eyes a little. He was not in the mood to talk to anyone right now.

"Who's a fucking bastard?" she repeated, clearly expecting an answer.

He bared his teeth, feeling his fangs grow. Fine, she wanted to know? Then he'd tell her.

"Humans," he said harshly, his expression darkening. "I'm going to kill every single one of them for what they did." He was pretty sure he remembered that she had implied that these Shinigami were like the Nobles of the spiritual world. Maybe she'd try to give him a big, grand speech about how wrong and evil it was to kill humans. It wouldn't make any difference.

She stared at him for a moment, expression unreadable. Then she nodded and said, "I see." She moved up a little so that she was standing at the other end of the balcony.

Muzaka watched her, both heavily annoyed and a little incredulous. He didn't _want_ company right now. He wanted her to leave, he wanted to be alone. But instead of turning tail and running the second she caught wind of his anger like most people did, she had just come closer. And she hadn't even seemed perturbed by his statement!

And what was with that 'I see'?

"What the hell do you mean, 'I see'?" he asked angrily.

She looked at him for a long moment with sad eyes. "I just know what you're going through," she finally said.

What the – ? "You don't know anything about what I'm going through," he spat. How dare this woman.

Arien's eyes flashed, and for a second he thought she was going to attack him. But then the moment was gone.

She faced him.

"You're right. I don't _know_ what you are going through. But I can guess."

Her eyes became unfocused, as if she wasn't really looking at him anymore.

"My guess is you lost someone. Someone that you cared about, that you loved. Someone you lived for and wanted to protect. And you lost them. And it _hurts_ , it hurts so bad you don't know how to cope, how to _accept_ that this happened. So you hide behind your hate, because hate is _good_ and revenge makes you feel like you have a purpose, gives you a goal that you can work towards so that you don't have to face the fact that they _died_ , that you couldn't protect them, that you weren't _strong_ enough to protect them, even though _strength was all you had_."

She shook her head and continued, her voice softening like she had forgotten he was even there.

"But revenge is just a cover. You're not really after revenge. You're after death."

She closed her eyes and looked down, a single tear running down her cheek, and suddenly it became clear to him. She wasn't just talking about him. She was talking about herself as well.

"You think death is the only escape from the pain and hate and _guilt_. But you can't just kill yourself. You're a fighter, a warrior, and by god you deserve to die with _some_ honor, don't you? In a fight against someone with the power to kill you, preferably against someone you respect. But… there are… so _few_ people in this world with that kind of power. You've become so strong that you have extremely limited options when it comes to an honorable death."

She looked up at him and began to speak normally again, her face composed. The tear marks were still visible.

"Is that not why you've been lingering here, among these Nobles?" she asked simply. "You know they will move to protect any humans you put in danger, and that you're strong enough that they'll have to kill you to prevent human deaths. If you truly just wanted to kill humans, this would be the last place you would want to be. You could go across the world and start there, always running before they caught you. Instead, you're willingly staying in close contact with almost half a dozen powerful Nobles, making preparations so that the people you do care about are kept safe, and are able to keep up a front of happiness because you know it won't be much longer now before you won't have to feel anything."

She smiled, and her smile was full of pain.

"Was I close?"

He continued to stare at her with the same shocked expression he had had for most of her speech. Then he nodded. He had no idea how else to respond. One some level he could barely even comprehend what she had said, but each sentence, each _word_ , she had spoken had struck a chord with him, not just because she had almost perfectly described his situation, reaction, and feelings, but because it was both horribly devastating and strangely comforting to know that he was not alone.

She nodded sadly and turned around to head back into the house.

"Who was it for you?" he asked her quietly before she reached the door.

She paused, hand on the doorknob, but she didn't turn back around.

"My siblings," she answered just as quietly, "the only people who ever cared about me, the real me. I couldn't save them."

Another pause.

"You?"

Muzaka's throat restricted, but he forced a response.

"My… daughter," he choked out, and closed his eyes. He couldn't say anything else. This was the first time he had actually said it out loud, and the words hung in the air with such finality that he felt the tears escape against his will. She was really gone. Nothing he could do would bring her back. What was he supposed to do now?

Arien flinched at his words and her grip tightened on the doorknob.

"I'm sorry. For your loss," she said softly, sincerely.

He just nodded, though he knew she couldn't see him.

"How do I move on?" he asked, his voice almost a whisper it was so thick with emotion.

She turned her head slightly towards him, and he could see that the pained smiled was back.

"If I knew how to move on, I would tell you. Personally, I don't know if I'll ever be able to truly move on."

Her expression changed, became thoughtful.

"I don't think I want to regress or remain in stasis, but… moving on is also too hard for me to do. The memories are still too fresh, too painful for me to just move on. I've been thinking about this for a while. Those are usually the only two options that people tell you about: self-destruct or bravely accept it."

She finally met his eye, a slight smile on her face.

"But what about moving sideways?" she asked. "No one ever talks about that. No one makes heroic or tragic movies or composes ballads about simply doing your best to continue to live. I can't just 'move on,' so instead I'll move laterally, neither dwelling on what happened nor forgetting it. Because honestly, I don't _know_ what I really want to do. So for now I'm going to do my best to just accept my circumstances and make the best of them. That's what I've decided to do."

She looked down for a moment and touched her fingers to her chest, right over the scars.

Then she looked up at him.

"What about you, Muzaka? What do you want to do?"

He stared at her for several minutes.

"You know what?" he said. "I don't know what I want to do either."

She tilted her head thoughtfully and smiled at him, and he couldn't help the small smile that appeared.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** So I've thought a lot about Muzaka, and I really don't think he plans on going through with the whole 'killing humanity' thing. Muzaka's a good guy but these people went and pressed the one shiny red button he had and even though he's lived for so long, Idt he has the emotional maturity to deal with someone so close to him dying. So he tells himself he's going to kill humanity, but all he's been doing is making it really obvious that he's in cahoots with Crombell (someone he knows Rai would never approve of and that Franky hates) and hangs around with the one guy who has a chance at killing him while talking about how much he hates all the people Rai loves.

I think at a subconscious level at least he's doing everything in his power to make sure Rai has a reason to kill him, so he can both die as a warrior and be free of the pain of losing Ashleen.

This chapter may seem like a cop out, how Muzaka is gonna at least attempt to carry on and not think about killing humanity, but I genuinely believe that Muzaka could be brought 100% back to the good side if someone just let him know that he's not alone, that what he's feeling is normal, and that there are other options (I'm looking at you, Rai!). In this story, that person is Arien.

I've been thinking about something like this happening between the two of them because it shows the similarities between their circumstances. I'll reveal at least one more similarity later, but for now I'm just gonna stick with this.

Thanks for reading! ^_^


	18. Chapter 18

Arien cracked open the door to the room and cocked her head a little, listening intently.

There was a lot of noise coming from downstairs.

She hesitated in the doorway. With the noise level increasing it likely meant that the members of the household who had left earlier that day had returned. She could feel almost everyone's energy centralized downstairs, including several she didn't recognize, probably in the sitting room they had gathered in before. One room filled with Nobles, werewolves, and enhanced humans. The sheer amount of power concentrated in that room was staggering.

But that wasn't why she hesitated. She could deal with incredible energy pressure all day. She just… wasn't looking forward to walking into the room, sitting down and talking to them. Her stomach clenched uncomfortably at the thought.

Arien frowned. Was she… nervous?

Her eyes widened slightly as the thought bubbled up to the surface of her mind. She had _never_ been nervous before. Even though she had fought countless soul-devouring Hollows, had travelled between dimensions, and had conducted dangerous experiments on herself, she had never been _nervous_. She never had the time or luxury to feel nervous; the stakes were always too high, with someone's life always hanging in the balance.

So why was it such a big deal for her to do something as simple, mundane, and non-life-threatening as conversing with a group of people?

Though, perhaps it wasn't so strange. She had been fighting for as long as she could remember. So it makes sense that life-threatening situations didn't make her nervous. To her, a fight for her life _was_ simple and mundane because it happened so often.

Conversing with strangers, on the other hand….

Her eyes went out of focus a little as she examined the implications. Now that she thought about it, besides her siblings and a few of the more rational Arrancar, she had never just talked to anyone. What had transpired earlier with these people didn't count. That had been a mixture of a business exchange and a strange whim that she had indulged. There had been no casual chatting on her part, not even during breakfast. She had talked to Muzaka, sure, but again that had been no casual chat.

What did people talk about normally? Or more specifically, what did a group of Nobles, werewolves, and humans talk about normally?

Arien drummed her fingers rapidly against the doorframe and scowled. This was ridiculous. She shouldn't be nervous, _afraid_ , to go talk to these people. What's the worst that could happen, anyway?

She steeled herself, unconsciously straightening her spine and pulling her shoulders back. She marched down the stairs towards the sitting room, noticing the increase in noise level as she got closer.

She once again paused at the doorway, perhaps because the ball of nerves in her stomach seemed to be weighing her down a little. She took a slow, deep breath. Then, almost as an afterthought, she ran her hands through her hair a few times and checked her clothes, making sure the shirt and shorts she wore were appropriate for company. She had no real interest in her physical appearance – physical appearance didn't keep you alive – but she was in the human world now, and humans placed a good deal of importance on physical attributes. When in Rome and all that.

Satisfied that she looked presentable, she smiled as naturally as she knew how and stepped around the corner.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

Frankenstein eyes were unfocused as he sat in his study doing paperwork. Or at least attempting to do paperwork. He sighed wearily. Ever since his Master had found him he had quickly noticed that there was a direct relationship between the number of people in his house and the amount of unfinished paperwork he had, and it wasn't just because he had less time to do it. Compared to the health of the people in his care, the importance of his paperwork paled. Yet at the same time he could not simply forego his duties, because the happiness of the people in his care stemmed heavily from their time at the school. All the paperwork he went through was an opportunity to increase their happiness, as well as the happiness of his students in general.

But even so, he found it hard to concentrate.

Muzaka had just come to him, informing him of his intentions to remain here indefinitely. Frankenstein hadn't honestly thought Muzaka would accept Master's offer to formally reside here, but he knew his Master would be pleased to have Muzaka around, even if Frankenstein would not. With Muzaka staying it almost certainly meant Garda would stay here as well. He would have to make arrangements at the school for both of them. He had already decided on making them both students – Muzaka so he could maybe learn something for once, and Garda so she could remain near Muzaka.

But that wasn't one of the reasons why he found it so hard to focus on his paperwork.

There had been something different about Muzaka. Whenever Frankenstein had seen Muzaka since he had woken up, he had acted like, well, himself. A touch less exuberant, perhaps, but otherwise the only indication he gave that he had experienced something so traumatic as losing a child was the few times he had given a brief speech about ending humanity. The transition between these two dispositions, amicable and hateful, was like night and day, and both had worried Frankenstein.

Frankenstein was not heartless or insensitive. He had experienced his fair share of loss over his lifetime, and had his fair share of regrets. Muzaka wasn't the first to act as he had. In fact, Muzaka had just followed in his own footsteps: upon hearing of the death of a child, Frankenstein had also lost himself, turned into a rage-filled monster, and attacked Raizel-nim. And Tesamu hadn't even been his flesh-and-blood child. He could not bring himself to forgive Muzaka for what he had done, because he could not forgive himself.

Muzaka was not the first person Frankenstein had seen who either tried to act like nothing was wrong by carrying on as usual or who let themselves be consumed by their loss. Or in this case, both. Being in denial just forces all your emotions stew inside of you, until eventually it becomes too painful to deal with. Being filled with rage closes your eyes to what was around you and limits your ability to form relationships and make rational decisions. As Raizel's Bonded, he could not forgive Muzaka. But as a doctor and friend, he could not help but worry about Muzaka's mental health.

But when Muzaka had entered his study not long ago he had been different. His amiable, devil-may-care attitude had been gone, replaced by a more refined, introspective demeanor. It was hope that Muzaka had come out of his denial. And the fact that he wanted to stay meant that perhaps he was letting his hatred for humanity go. Or at least considering it.

It had also been obvious that he had been crying.

Muzaka's decision had come as a surprise to Frankenstein, but he tentatively decided it was for the best for Muzaka to socialize among humans and keep his Master company.

Tentatively.

He turned his attention back to his paperwork.

Only to get distracted by thoughts of the other wildcard in the house: Arien.

His Master had never harbored ulterior motives for permitting the motley crew they had come across to reside with them, and neither had Frankenstein. His curiosity, once insatiable, had been reasonably culled by time and discipline, and despite the lies and slander the Union spread he had never derived joy from experimenting on innocent humans the way they did. He wanted nothing but happiness for every member in the household. Neither he nor his Master wanted or needed anything else from them.

But all the same, he truly hoped Arien would stay.

She was the closest he had come to finding a way to reverse his Master's condition. The current Lord had also done something similar, but her method explicitly required the use of a soul weapon that had not only been previously split, but also specifically primed for the express purpose of refilling life force. Even if one of the current Clan Leaders was willing to sacrifice their power and the power of their clan, he knew his Master would never agree. Raskreia had at least been intelligent enough to not ask for Master's permission to restore his energy. His Master would have undoubtedly refused if she had.

But Arien's restoration power was unknown to him. And it would remain unknown if she chose not to stay.

Had it cost her some of her power, like it had for Raskreia?

Was it replicable?

Would she be willing to perform it again should Master's health drop?

He could only hope he could convince her to remain in contact with them, or at least give a more detailed account on how she was able to restore Master's energy.

He sighed softly. He was being a bit selfish, wasn't he? Only thinking of himself, how he might could harness the power that had saved Master. It was already quite clear that the young lady liked to keep herself to herself. Though she had thoroughly explained about the origin of her abilities, she had not divulged the details of her abilities. Frankenstein was not about to badger a woman who had undergone the trauma of experiments just for his own benefit. His Master had wanted him to offer her a safe refuge purely because she was as lost as all the other household members, not to use her to gain knowledge.

He had every intention of respecting her decision, whatever it might be.

Frankenstein glanced at the clock and stood up. He was getting nowhere with his paperwork and nowhere with his circling thoughts. Master and the children should be here soon. He may as well give his mind a break by rectifying an oversight caused by the influx of guests.

 **-xxxxxxx-**

Arien had been in the room for all of about 3 seconds before cries erupted around her. She tensed, looking for the danger but seeing none. Then she realized that the cries were coming from four people she didn't recognize. And that they were not cries of distress, but appeared to be rather loud, exaggerated greetings.

And that they were from children.

Well, teenagers. Teenagers wearing the same uniform as Raizel, Regis and Seira. She had wondered why she had felt several unknown presences earlier. So these four must be acquaintances of the Nobles who attended Ye Ran.

"Chairman, how many people came to visit you today? Because right now we're up to five! You ever think about opening a hotel?" The red-headed boy seemed oblivious to Frankenstein's dangerously twitching eyebrow.

One of the girls slapped his arm. "Don't be rude, Shinwoo."

The boy named Shinwoo rubbed his arm and looked like he was about to respond, but stopped when Frankenstein cleared his throat pointedly.

"This is Arien. Arien, this is Han Shinwoo," a brief wave, "Im Suyi," a charming smile, "Woo Ikhan," a smile and a polite wave, "and Seo Yuna," a shy smile.

Arien smiled back to each one before moving towards the center of the room a little more. Hovering at the edge would seem unnatural. It wasn't what normal humans did. Case in point, almost all the non-humans, with the exception of Raizel, Tao, and Muzaka, were hovering around the edges of the room, despite the increase in the number of seating arrangements that had not been there a few hours earlier.

Arien felt her own eyebrow starting to twitch. Garda, Lunark, and Kentas were still standing defensively behind Muzaka, and though the children didn't outright demand an explanation for their sudden appearance or strange behavior, she knew that this was hardly normal. Had no one ever showed these people how to act like normal humans?

She strode forward and purposely sat down on one of the long couches. As uncomfortable as she was with the idea of conversing with complete strangers, there was no need to draw unnecessary attention to themselves.

She kept her smile confident as she sat next to one of the boys – Ikhan – and began listening to their conversation. All she needed to do was grasp the basics of the topic of discussion and she would be able to join in like a normal human.

She quickly discovered that it would be harder than she thought.

She had no idea what they were talking about. She didn't let it show on her face, pretending to follow the conversation as it jumped, no, somersaulted from one topic to another and back again with hardly a common factor or pause.

Not for the first time in this house she found herself bewildered. What did it all mean? Video games? Idols? Apps? And who was Pedro? Why did he need to guard a gate? Why did these kids need to get _through_ a guarded gate?

Arien glanced at the other three sitting around her. Tao was happily putting his two cents in whenever he could. He obviously knew what they were talking about. Raizel was quietly sipping his tea, eyes always on the person speaking, though she couldn't tell if he was following the conversation or if he was just faking it like she was. Muzaka was smiling slightly, but his unfocused eyes gave away that he was not even paying attention to the conversation. She glared at him. The humans would find it strange if he did not appear engaged in the conversation. If they asked him a question and he didn't respond quickly and appropriately, it would cast suspicion upon him.

She turned her attention back to the nonsensical conversation, waiting for someone to require her to participate.

No one did.

The children chatted excitedly and loudly, but not one of them commented on or even seemed to notice the silence of their companions. There was no demand for an explanation of her presence, nor did any of them find it strange that she was not speaking.

She relaxed a little. Maybe she had been overthinking it. Maybe she was the one who didn't know how to act human.

Her smile softened as she watched the children talk animatedly. Was it truly so simple for them, to be around such strange beings and yet not care about their strangeness? To create bonds so easily, even with people as socially awkward, as, well, all of them it seemed? If she had known how accepting humans were, she would have spent more time among them.

"Hey, Arien!"

The sound of her name demanded her attention.

She looked across the table to Shinwoo. When it was obvious he had her attention he smiled and asked, "I just wanted to know if you were gonna be staying here with us?"

She felt the eyes of several members of the house on her as the question hung in the air, but she didn't meet any of them. Instead she gave her undivided attention to the young boy sitting across from her.

She smiled widely and a small laugh escaped her. This place was somehow ridiculously absurd and yet perfectly comfortable. What else could she say but, "Yes, I think I'll be staying for a while."

 **-xxxxxxx-**

 **A/N:** We all know that Frankenstein is a good guy, who doesn't maliciously experiment on people, but I feel like Frankenstein glossing over the information he could get out of the spiritual world would be disingenuous, especially since it looks like it can be used to save Rai. I don't think we need to be regaled a third time with Frankenstein's curiosity speech lol.

And yes, Frankenstein decided to make more furniture for the sitting room since there's so many people there now lol.

I rewrote the last part half a dozen times, I just couldn't get it to come out right. I was trying to show how unused to company and normal human interaction Arien is, while also showing that it wasn't an entirely unpleasant experience for her. She's kinda like Rai in that matter, though she expresses it differently than him. Not quite sure how I did, but it's been so long since I posted an update for this story that I wanted to just get it out.

I've received a lot of questions in the reviews, which is awesome! However, as much as I would love to answer all of them right now, I am hoping to answer them through exposition and narrative as the story goes on.

Thanks everyone! The next few chapters should be fun as Arien, Muzaka and Co join Team South Korea and shenanigans ensue xD


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